Does Noisy Eating and Loud Gum Chewing Drive You Crazy? You May Have Misophonia

Photo: Sam Diephuis/Getty

If every loud crunch of cereal or hair-tingling slurp of soupmakes you want to scream, you may have a real neurological condition — and you’re not alone.

While it was formally named as a condition in 2001, many skeptics still questioned whether misophonia was a real condition. But last year, a study published in thejournalCurrent Biologyshowed that those with the disorderhave a difference in their brain’s frontal lobethat causes an intense reaction to noise, and can even lead to a faster heart rate and sweating.

“I hope this will reassure sufferers,” Tim Griffiths, Professor of Cognitive Neurology at Newcastle University and University College London, said in apress release. “I was part of the skeptical community myself until we saw patients in the clinic and understood how strikingly similar the features are.”

And in February, another study found that having misophoniacan impact people’s ability to learn.

According to the study, published in thejournalApplied Cognitive Psycology, a noise as subtle as gum chewing is enough to impact academic performance.

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“Some people areespecially sensitiveto relatively subtle specific background sounds like chewing, and this sensitivity can be distracting enough to impair learning,” study co-author Logan Fiorella, an assistant professor of applied cognition and development at the University of Georgia, toldTIME.

The researchers had 72 college students study papers on migraines, with half sitting in a room with a person chewing gum, and the others without. They all then took a test on the material in silence, and those with the gum-chewer had lower test scores.

source: people.com