July 17, 2013 • 28 mins
Why are online "whisper" communities giving people brain orgasms? Caroline and Cristen discuss autonomous sensory meridian response, or ASMR, and investigate what's up with those strange tingling sensations.
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to stuff Mom never told you. From how Stuff
Works dot Com. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Caroline and I'm Kristin and Kristen. Um. I have heard
of a s MR very sort of vaguely in the
media online, you know, there are articles about it, and
(00:25):
I really thought, well, that's weird, that's billy, I've never
felt that before. And then as I started to read
more about it, I realized, oh, wait, yes you have.
Starting from a very young age, when I would be
hanging out with my little girlfriends in elementary school and
we would be braiding each other's hair, I would get
(00:46):
this like incredibly relaxed, almost tingly headed feeling when they
were braiding my hair, and I realized that, my friend,
is what these people are talking about. Yes, we're talking
about autonomous sensory more Ridian response known as a s MR.
And it's not a clinically accepted term. It's more of
(01:08):
a neologism that has been used to describe this sensory experience,
often referred to as a brain orgasm. And when a
listener first wrote in about this months ago now mentioning
an s MR, saying you'll should do a podcast on this,
and then he described what it was and I immediately
(01:30):
knew what he was talking about. I didn't know that
there was a word for it, but I definitely knew
what he was talking about. And you mentioned your girlfriends
and the hair brushing. I had a similar experience with
a babysitter who would brush my hair sometimes and it
was just so gentle with it, and it would just
give me tingles and um. So we decided every like you,
(01:56):
you had heard more about it, and you emailed me.
And since that guy had emailed, I've done some research
as well, and we decided to do something on a SMR,
even though it's a little bit outside of our our
normal sminty wheelhouse. But among the a s MR online community,
a lot of the people involved who are referred to
(02:17):
as evokers, and these will talk about more. But there
are people who make a s MR videos to try
to trigger these tingling brain orgasms. A lot of them
are women, so there is a gendered aspect to this.
But first let's let's give listeners some more information about
(02:38):
what a s MR is, because I feel like if
you haven't experienced it, it seems very strange, right. And
it was originally greeted with a lot of skepticism, especially
from science the scientific community. People are like, that's not
really a thing, but a lot of people have come
out and said, now, if people experience it, it is
(02:59):
real and and um. One neuroscientist Stephen Novella said that
it's similar in that way to migraine headaches. We know
they exist as a syndrome primarily because many different people
report the same constellation of symptoms and natural history. So basically, um,
what people are experiencing is certain triggers, which we'll talk
(03:19):
about in a second. Certain triggers set off this feeling
of relaxation. A lot of people use it, for instance,
to overcome anxiety or to overcome insomnia and be able
to sleep at night. And it's accompanied sometimes by by
the tingles, so your your scalp might tangle, the sensation
might go down your arms and legs. And some of
(03:41):
these videos um actually have been flagged on like YouTube,
for instance, for adult content or inappropriate content, because it's
like some people associated with almost a fetish community. But
that's really not that's really not the gist of it.
It's really not meant as like a sexual thing or
meant to ex cite people sexually. It's it's sort of
(04:02):
the opposite. Yeah, And to give some better insight into
what that sensation is, there are all sorts of colloquialisms
for a s MR and the experience of it, such
as attention induced euphoria, attention induced head orgasm, attention induced
(04:22):
observing euphoria, brain gasm, buzzing, celestial wash that sound nice.
I like to take a celestial wash, um, and that
one's more related to spiritual theory. Some people get very
into it and almost derived like a whole meditative state
from SMR. Goose sloping, which sounds like a euphemism from masturbation.
(04:43):
I would just like to say, yes, it does that.
Once you start talking about goose looping, you're probably gonna
get flagged on YouTube. But also hairgasm, headgasm, nerv alanch
how about that portmanteau of nerve and avalanche. And I
understand that because it sometimes does feel like it's swooping
from the top of your head all the way down
your spine and then finally we have WHS or weird
(05:04):
head sensation. Yeah, I mean it is an interesting feeling
and something that I was thinking, Uh, and a lot
of other researchers have asked two, is is this not
just something that we all experience in one degree or
another at one time or another, and maybe we're just
now coming together and talking about it thanks Internet. Well,
(05:27):
I don't know if it's a thing that everybody experiences.
It could be the a s m R is a
lot more common than it might seem. When you hear
words like head gasm, celestial wash, you know you mighty
hear them and say, no, that doesn't happen to me.
But when you consider the range of a s MR
triggers that people have identified, and then the online community
(05:50):
started to make videos of to sort of stimulate that
auditory response, the triggers include things like soothing voices, NPR
is a big trigger for a lot of people, and
Bob Ross. Yes, the let's paint happy trees trees. Bob
Ross is a common trigger. I don't on almost any
(06:11):
a s MR blog, you'll hear about Bob Ross and
I briefly listen to a little Bob Ross audio and
I totally got it. I get it now, I totally
get it. I remember watching it as a kid and
thinking it was like the most relaxing thing ever, because
he he's got this real soft voice, gal and he's
just painting those happy clouds and those happy trees. And
(06:34):
I get it well as British journalists Roadri Marsden put
it in an article about a SMR and The Independent.
He explains how Bob Ross clearly took all of the
a s m R boxes, expertise, precision, reassuring speech patterns
and gentle sounds, from which that characteristic tingling inevitably follows,
(06:55):
and so along similar lines. Other common triggers are massa obviously,
I mean, that's going to probably be very relaxing, getting
a manicure, pedicure, getting a haircut, just soothing voices in general,
as we've said, someone paying extremely close attention to a task,
and I have heard anecdotally about one that reminded me
(07:18):
of that. The thing about someone paying a close attention
to a task someone I know says that they're a SMR.
Trigger has been when uh, in school, if a teacher
or professor is reading a paper that they wrote in
front of them just like that, and it's that close
attention and then like or reading it allowed. I don't
(07:40):
know what it is. I don't Yeah, I might need
a listener to write in and explain that one, because
I know there are videos of like people folding towels
for a Chile and I just like, as someone who
hates to put away my laundry and fold it, I'm like, well,
it's more of the tell folding tutorial. And I want
a lot of these videos to you are simulations and
(08:02):
kind of role playing, which again gets people thinking that
it's a weird fetish thing. Um, but it really is
all just about these noises and um. As far of
my research for this podcast, I tried to watch one
on a haircut. It was the simulation that that you,
the viewer, we're getting a haircut, and the woman had
(08:23):
a three D microphone, so it actually sounded like she
was walking around, you know, and and trimming all parts
of of your hair and playing with your hair and stuff.
And I kind of got it, but then once it
required the certain detachment, because once my brain kicked in
and said, Christen, you're watching a video in which you're
(08:46):
having to pretend that this woman you don't know is
cutting your hair. This is very strange. I just and
then I just lost it. Yeah, I would imagine as
part of the whole process of relaxing and getting into it.
You really can't be self conscious about it or be
self aware or aware of you know, it's it's definitely
a suspension of disbelief. You kind of just have to
(09:07):
roll with it. But how and when did a SMR
first emerged? Because I feel like it's just sprung up recently,
even though like for you and me both we have
memories of this to go back to our childhood. Well,
it kind of gained traction earlier this century. On October ninete,
two thousand seven, Steady Health Forums member okay whatever posted
(09:31):
a thread titled weird sensation Feels Good, describing a strange,
itchy sensation triggered by several different social interactions and it
kind of grew from there. So in December two thousand eight,
there was a Yahoo group started called Society of Sensationalists.
It was launched with a similar purpose, gaining over thirty
two hundred members in less than three years. Yeah, and
(09:54):
in two thousand and ten, a s MR really went
big time with Hug Your Brain Day, which was partially
organized by Jennifer Allen, who also launched the a s
MR Research and Support website after she coined the term
autonomous sensory Meridian response and a related Facebook group, and
of course who catches onto this but Reddit users um so.
(10:18):
On February two eleven, we have the first a s
MR Reddit discussion board popping up all of this. By
the way, this timeline is coming from no your mame
dot com and I feel like it really hit the
mainstream mainstream on March twenty nine, two thousand thirteen. Earlier
this year, when novelist Andrew Siegel did a This American
(10:40):
Life story about her a s MR triggers. Yeah, and
everything I read comments that I see online people who
are talking about this. Under every article you see about
a s m R or column, people are like, oh
my god, I never knew there was a name for this.
I have felt this, uh since childhood, or I feel
this every day, or you know, I've always wondered and
I just thought everybody had it, or or I thought
(11:01):
I was the only one who had it. And so
it's interesting to watch uh in real time, like the
evolution of this concept, whether it's really medical or not
online as people talk about it. Yeah, that that online
factor has been so important to it. I feel like
if it weren't for discussion boards and Facebook groups and
(11:22):
things like that, we we wouldn't really know about it.
We would still every now and then get a cool
head gasm and be like, oh that was nice, and
I'll get you can't wait from the next haircut. And
that's one of the reasons why a Slate writer referred
to it as this convergence of quote, technology, alienation, and intimacy.
So it's become something that we only thought that we experienced,
(11:44):
but now they're all of these communities who have developed
these little languages around it. Yeah, and part of that language,
I mean you mentioned evokers, Kristen, the people who create
the trigger videos. There are chasers, the people who go
to great links to experience a s m R. So
they might sit on YouTube all day and watch these videos.
There was one video I watched that included fingernail tapping,
(12:08):
rubbing paper together, whispering, and the one that I was like,
I'm turning this off now, she was like dipping her
hands in and out of a bowl of water really fast,
and I was like, that just sounds that sounds chriss um. So, yeah,
these videos are made for chasers. And then we have
asthma's or even as marian's. Who are the people who
experience this condition a s MR? And they really go
(12:31):
out and seek out these videos in the a s
m R community on YouTube, a lot of which are
made by women. Yeah, and and the whole point about
the videos is that it's a way to get a
jolt of a s MR. You know, obviously you can't
go and get a massage or a haircut every day probably, um,
So there's this whole community that has sprung up making
(12:53):
all sorts of videos specifically geared to, you know, set
off off those kinds of head orgasms, the celestial washes
by trying out different triggers like that you were talking about,
the fingernail tapping, the running fingers over hairbrush bristles, things
(13:14):
like that. And like you said, a lot of them
are made by women. And there was an article in
Vice magazine about this and they interviewed Maria, who is
known on YouTube as Gentle Whispering, and she says that
one of the reasons why women make so many of
these videos is that quote, if a guy is in
front of the camera and whispering, there aren't many things
(13:35):
he can do that won't seem creepy, but I mean
by the same token though, the first time I watched one,
because a lot of them are, it's referred to as
a whispering community because a lot of these videos do
involve women. And I'm not going to do this into
the mike right now because I'm sure that would be
kind of off putting for people, but a lot of
the videos are women whispering directly into the mic. And
(13:58):
the first time I send to one and watched one,
I was initially kind of creeped out, but then once
it started sitting off head tingles, I was like, Okay,
this isn't this isn't so bad, It's not so creepy.
They're interesting issues brought up though, of what exactly is
causing it, Like we know what's happening, but why do
(14:19):
we response is strongly to do these whispers feminine whisper
and and a lot of people have brought up the
theory that maybe this is something that reaches back to
our mother's uh Emma a k A. Lush Whispers told
The Independent, maybe it's because of our experience as we
had as children, a mother's voice, a kind teacher, a
friendly optometris because some of those role playing videos are
(14:43):
like you're getting a monologue from the dentist or the optometris,
some professional who has to be very close to your face.
And she says that it can be a mixture of
the sounds and visual stimuli that trigger response. Yeah, in
more formal terms, a slate posture, it's that maybe, Um,
the a SMR videos address a desire to regain some
(15:05):
pre lapse Sarian state of mother child unity. Um, because
there are also a lot of videos that involve um,
these whisperers basically saying like you're gonna be okay, you
work so hard, uh, you know, oh you're sick, let
me take care of you, like very nurturing and coddling
(15:25):
as well. But asmar blogger Heather Feathers Um notes that
there are also plenty of male evokers out there, but
that they deal with some haters on YouTube because a
lot of viewers assume that they won't like hearing a
man in a nurturing role or that it will make
them uncomfortable, kind of like what Maria of Gentle Whispering
(15:47):
said about how you know, if we see a guy
whispering to a camera, it's just automatically going to be creepy.
And I did sheet Heather Feathers that some links to
some male evokers that she liked, and so I watched
one of them and and he was, yeah, it was
still gentle and uh tingly. I mean, I don't think
(16:10):
that you can say that all men evokers would be creepy,
just like I don't think all women evokers are necessarily
un creepy. I think it depends on your video, It
depends on what the person saying, and you're going to
find something creepy that somebody else won't and vice versa.
So well, and this also deals with like how how
we're using the word creepy, you know, for a as
(16:31):
far people who are out there who might be very
much into the whispering community would probably take offense at
that descriptor. But at the end of the day, the
thing is maybe not creepy. But at the end of
the day, it is strange to think about intentionally whispering
into a microphone and maybe slowly opening a bag of
(16:53):
potato chips and eating them very quietly, because that's one
of the triggers for people to that that celephane frankly, Yeah,
but don't crinkle too glad or too fast. That's right,
that's a slow, gentle crinkle. But um, but again, a
s MR community members always want to emphasize that even
though you know you use terms like brain orgasm, headgasm, hairgasm,
(17:18):
it's not a sexual thing, right, It just I mean,
it just feels good, but not necessarily in a sexual way.
I mean, just because something feels good and is relaxing.
I mean, I think that is why people are calling it,
you know, blank gasm. But it definitely does not equate
to an actual orgasm, as people who have had orgasms
(17:40):
could tell you. But I do wonder, though, Caroline, if
at this point people who are listening who are not
familiar with what we're talking about, and we're sitting here
talking about having experienced this, if maybe we sound a
little crazy. I don't know, maybe we do. Well. We're
usually we're usually more skeptical in the side of things,
(18:00):
but once we both started researching this was like, oh, yeah,
we experienced this. But I mean speaking of skepticism though,
like we said at the top of the podcast, when
the term autonomous sensory meridian response a s MR first
popped up online, a lot of people did greeted with skepticism,
and in fact, when someone first created a Wikipedia page
(18:21):
for it, it was promptly taken down because Wicki editors
said that it lacked scientific evidence, although now the page
is back up and there are no flags on it
because I think that it's received enough media attention. And
there are also some researchers looking into who want to
put people who claim to experience a SMR into an
(18:42):
MRI machine so that they can hopefully see what their
brain looks like when it's being triggered, to try to
figure out what's going on. I believe there's a psychologist
at Dartmouth who's doing this. I mean, that's fascinating. I
would love to know the outcome of that. And I
know that that's the kind of stuff that Jen for Alan,
for instance, over at a s MR Research and Support
(19:03):
was really pushing for, like, Okay, this is a feeling
that people have, it's time to research it and see
what's going on. And psychologist Tom Stafford wrote for the
BBC that yeah, you know what, maybe the medical community
just hasn't caught up to people, since people are just
now kind of coming together and saying okay, there are
a lot of us that have felt this, and some
(19:24):
clinicians think that it could be a good thing to
glean more insight into because a lot of people used
it as a form of stress relief through a lot
of people who can't sleep, who can only finally get
to sleep by watching an s MR videos. So they're
wondering if they can see what's going on in the brain,
what kind of pathways that it might be triggering, that
(19:46):
maybe they could apply that to new kinds of therapies,
which could be great um, and a lot of people
have compared it to something like synesthesia, which is a
phenomenon where experiencing one sense results experiencing another one. For instance,
a common one it's called graphine color. It's where letters
(20:06):
might have a color in your brain, or if you
here read a specific word, there's a taste that goes
along with this. There are a lot of musicians in
fact um that have a form of or claim to
have a form of synesthesia where they see music in colors.
And for a long time, kind of like a s
(20:27):
MR synesthesia was written off as just some you know,
trippy whatever, like it wasn't something that people believed actually existed,
but then once the clinical community caught up to it,
they realized that, oh, this is actually something that does
happen in our brains. Yeah. I thought for a minute
when I was reading about that, I was like, oh
(20:48):
my god, I think I have that. And then I
started examining why I thought certain letters were certain colors,
and I was like, oh, no, that's just because of kindergarten,
because like remember your big alphabet charts were like A
was the apple, you know, and BE was like a bumblebee.
I'm like, oh, that's because red apple, And that's why
I think A is red. And so when you hear bees,
(21:09):
are they always yellow and black stripe? Yeah? Apparently, I guess.
I don't know, but I realized, no, Caroline, you're not
that special. It's just so stop reaching for all of
these weird brain cross wiring conditions. But yeah, speaking of
the cross wiring, though, some wonder whether a s MR
is just the result of that in which a trigger
(21:31):
like watching Bob Ross paint his happy trees is stimulating
a particular brain regions. Some also think that it's related
to serotonin release that sets off all of those calming,
happy feelings because you can't hit a ceiling with it,
like some of the One of the reasons why you
they're the term chaser exists is because if you watch
(21:56):
a lot of a s MR videos, you can almost
get a s m R out. It's almost as though
the brain can develop a tolerance for it, so it
needs to kind of reset. So it's kind of addictive,
kind of satisfying some need and you need more of it,
so it's like like mental crack. Yeah, but I I really,
(22:17):
I really wish that I could go into an MRI machine.
I want to know what's going on in my brain
now that there's language to go with it. I'm I'm
curious to see. And also knowing that there are these
videos that are out there to trigger them, I'm really
curious to know. Um. And also, I mean, if there
(22:40):
are any guys out there who make these videos, I'm
curious to know, because there is. I mean, it does
seem like it's overwhelmingly dominated by women. Like what is
it about those soft female voices, because I know exactly
the type of voice that they're talking about where it's
like almost Terry gross, but not it's not quite Terry gross.
(23:04):
Terry Gross is too like high pitched and nasally for
me and like creaky host of fresh air. Oh, I
don't know. I enjoy it, but it's not a smr ish.
I don't know. Um. I'm hoping though that listeners who
know what we're talking about right in, let us know
your triggers. Let's know, if you watch these videos, if
(23:25):
you've made these videos. Also let us know if you
think that we are cuckoo and you have no idea,
because I wonder if that is a different brain wiring too,
If there why would there not be some kind of
relaxation trigger. But also if you, you know, if you
really think that you have an experience that maybe you
need to do what I didn't think back to when
(23:46):
you were like seven and be like, oh right, hair
braiding made me just want to fall asleep in the library.
So maybe you need to, uh, you know, have go
get your hair braided like once a month or something.
It's a port with therapy. All the girls in the
office are like in a hair braiding circle. It's like
it's the three o'clock slump. We've got to do something,
(24:06):
do something to calm down. The bosses are really breathing
down my neck. Um, But yeah, right into us about
a s m R. If you will. Mom Stuff at
Discovery dot com is where you can send your emails.
You can tweet us at mom Stuff podcast, or send
us a message on Facebook. And we got a couple
of letters to read for you right when we get
(24:27):
back from a quick break. And now back to our letters, Kristen,
I have one here from Jamie. She was writing in
about our women's college episode. She says, I just recently
graduated from Mount Holyoke, which we were always told was
the first women's college in the country, and I identify
as transgender, specifically trans masculine slash gender queer. I am female,
(24:50):
assigned at birth and identified as trans before I entered
Mount Holyoke and was looking forward to being in an
environment that would allow issues such as trans issues to
be more relevant and potentially safer than co ed colleges.
The semester before I graduated, I and a few other faculty,
alums and professors in the area who identify as trans,
as well as our president, Lynn Pascarella, spoke on the
(25:11):
issue of trans spoke at all women's colleges. You might
notice a lot of trans men at women's colleges. Actually,
the issue is trans women. It gets really messy, especially
with Title nine. And while I think anyone who's not
assist gender male should be able to apply at a
women's college, I quite frankly think that trans women belong
at women's colleges such as Mount Holyoke more than I did.
(25:34):
There is a lot of work to be done gender
neutral bathrooms, ending extreme amounts of essentialists and transphobic language
and actions, and just all around equality and anti oppression.
I really really loved Mount Holyoke and got an incredible
education and made relationships with students, faculty, et cetera that
I think will last me a lifetime. Also, being a
part of the five college consortition was great. While I
(25:55):
can't speak about being straight at a woman's college, I
did meet lots of guys at all the schools, some
which became my best friend. Anyway, I had a great
time at Mount Holyoke, and I'm really happy that Trances
she was a being talked about so widely in all
types of conversations. So thank you, Jamie Well. I've got
an email here from Alessandra about women's colleges. She is
currently a senior at Barnard Whoop Whoop, one of the
(26:19):
Seven Sisters schools, and she writes, I was originally among
the ninety seven percent of high school girls whom you
quoted who would not consider attending a woman's college. I
had never heard of Barnard and checked it out on
a whim because my father really wanted me to. I
remember sitting down with two students and asking specifically about
the lack of boys, God forbid. These girls explained to
(26:40):
me that because of Barnard's unique relationship with Columbia University,
many of their classes did have boys, and they took
several of their core curriculum classes across the street at
the co ed school. Plus they said, it's New York,
there are plenty of boys, and so my fears were assuaged,
and I was even committed to applying early decision to
Barnard as my top joys. However, to my high school friends,
I continue to qualify my decision with statements like, oh,
(27:03):
it's not really in all women convent or anything, because
I was the only girl in the living memory of
my high school to even apply to a women's college,
and I definitely felt socially judged. Three years have gone
by since receiving my decision letter, and I no longer
feel awkward or compromising over my women's college choice. In fact,
more than any other part of college, the all women
(27:23):
component has been the most influential and educational to me. True,
it's not for everyone, and true I still encounter many
negative stereotypes from other college students when they hear I
to know women's college. However, I have found the opportunities
and experiences that I've been exposed to as a result
of my single sex education have played an invaluable informative
role in making me the capable and empowered feminist go
getter that I am today. Ps I recommend your podcast,
(27:46):
all my phones and all that well. Thank you, Alessandra,
and good luck finishing up at Barnard. It is an
impressive school to go too, and thanks to everybody who's
written in on seven. Discovery dot com is our email address.
You can follow us on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast,
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(28:10):
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stuff works dot com
Welcome to stuff Mom never told you. From how Stuff
Works dot Com. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Caroline and I'm Kristin and Kristen. Um. I have heard
of a s MR very sort of vaguely in the
media online, you know, there are articles about it, and
(00:25):
I really thought, well, that's weird, that's billy, I've never
felt that before. And then as I started to read
more about it, I realized, oh, wait, yes you have.
Starting from a very young age, when I would be
hanging out with my little girlfriends in elementary school and
we would be braiding each other's hair, I would get
(00:46):
this like incredibly relaxed, almost tingly headed feeling when they
were braiding my hair, and I realized that, my friend,
is what these people are talking about. Yes, we're talking
about autonomous sensory more Ridian response known as a s MR.
And it's not a clinically accepted term. It's more of
(01:08):
a neologism that has been used to describe this sensory experience,
often referred to as a brain orgasm. And when a
listener first wrote in about this months ago now mentioning
an s MR, saying you'll should do a podcast on this,
and then he described what it was and I immediately
(01:30):
knew what he was talking about. I didn't know that
there was a word for it, but I definitely knew
what he was talking about. And you mentioned your girlfriends
and the hair brushing. I had a similar experience with
a babysitter who would brush my hair sometimes and it
was just so gentle with it, and it would just
give me tingles and um. So we decided every like you,
(01:56):
you had heard more about it, and you emailed me.
And since that guy had emailed, I've done some research
as well, and we decided to do something on a SMR,
even though it's a little bit outside of our our
normal sminty wheelhouse. But among the a s MR online community,
a lot of the people involved who are referred to
(02:17):
as evokers, and these will talk about more. But there
are people who make a s MR videos to try
to trigger these tingling brain orgasms. A lot of them
are women, so there is a gendered aspect to this.
But first let's let's give listeners some more information about
(02:38):
what a s MR is, because I feel like if
you haven't experienced it, it seems very strange, right. And
it was originally greeted with a lot of skepticism, especially
from science the scientific community. People are like, that's not
really a thing, but a lot of people have come
out and said, now, if people experience it, it is
(02:59):
real and and um. One neuroscientist Stephen Novella said that
it's similar in that way to migraine headaches. We know
they exist as a syndrome primarily because many different people
report the same constellation of symptoms and natural history. So basically, um,
what people are experiencing is certain triggers, which we'll talk
(03:19):
about in a second. Certain triggers set off this feeling
of relaxation. A lot of people use it, for instance,
to overcome anxiety or to overcome insomnia and be able
to sleep at night. And it's accompanied sometimes by by
the tingles, so your your scalp might tangle, the sensation
might go down your arms and legs. And some of
(03:41):
these videos um actually have been flagged on like YouTube,
for instance, for adult content or inappropriate content, because it's
like some people associated with almost a fetish community. But
that's really not that's really not the gist of it.
It's really not meant as like a sexual thing or
meant to ex cite people sexually. It's it's sort of
(04:02):
the opposite. Yeah, And to give some better insight into
what that sensation is, there are all sorts of colloquialisms
for a s MR and the experience of it, such
as attention induced euphoria, attention induced head orgasm, attention induced
(04:22):
observing euphoria, brain gasm, buzzing, celestial wash that sound nice.
I like to take a celestial wash, um, and that
one's more related to spiritual theory. Some people get very
into it and almost derived like a whole meditative state
from SMR. Goose sloping, which sounds like a euphemism from masturbation.
(04:43):
I would just like to say, yes, it does that.
Once you start talking about goose looping, you're probably gonna
get flagged on YouTube. But also hairgasm, headgasm, nerv alanch
how about that portmanteau of nerve and avalanche. And I
understand that because it sometimes does feel like it's swooping
from the top of your head all the way down
your spine and then finally we have WHS or weird
(05:04):
head sensation. Yeah, I mean it is an interesting feeling
and something that I was thinking, Uh, and a lot
of other researchers have asked two, is is this not
just something that we all experience in one degree or
another at one time or another, and maybe we're just
now coming together and talking about it thanks Internet. Well,
(05:27):
I don't know if it's a thing that everybody experiences.
It could be the a s m R is a
lot more common than it might seem. When you hear
words like head gasm, celestial wash, you know you mighty
hear them and say, no, that doesn't happen to me.
But when you consider the range of a s MR
triggers that people have identified, and then the online community
(05:50):
started to make videos of to sort of stimulate that
auditory response, the triggers include things like soothing voices, NPR
is a big trigger for a lot of people, and
Bob Ross. Yes, the let's paint happy trees trees. Bob
Ross is a common trigger. I don't on almost any
(06:11):
a s MR blog, you'll hear about Bob Ross and
I briefly listen to a little Bob Ross audio and
I totally got it. I get it now, I totally
get it. I remember watching it as a kid and
thinking it was like the most relaxing thing ever, because
he he's got this real soft voice, gal and he's
just painting those happy clouds and those happy trees. And
(06:34):
I get it well as British journalists Roadri Marsden put
it in an article about a SMR and The Independent.
He explains how Bob Ross clearly took all of the
a s m R boxes, expertise, precision, reassuring speech patterns
and gentle sounds, from which that characteristic tingling inevitably follows,
(06:55):
and so along similar lines. Other common triggers are massa obviously,
I mean, that's going to probably be very relaxing, getting
a manicure, pedicure, getting a haircut, just soothing voices in general,
as we've said, someone paying extremely close attention to a task,
and I have heard anecdotally about one that reminded me
(07:18):
of that. The thing about someone paying a close attention
to a task someone I know says that they're a SMR.
Trigger has been when uh, in school, if a teacher
or professor is reading a paper that they wrote in
front of them just like that, and it's that close
attention and then like or reading it allowed. I don't
(07:40):
know what it is. I don't Yeah, I might need
a listener to write in and explain that one, because
I know there are videos of like people folding towels
for a Chile and I just like, as someone who
hates to put away my laundry and fold it, I'm like, well,
it's more of the tell folding tutorial. And I want
a lot of these videos to you are simulations and
(08:02):
kind of role playing, which again gets people thinking that
it's a weird fetish thing. Um, but it really is
all just about these noises and um. As far of
my research for this podcast, I tried to watch one
on a haircut. It was the simulation that that you,
the viewer, we're getting a haircut, and the woman had
(08:23):
a three D microphone, so it actually sounded like she
was walking around, you know, and and trimming all parts
of of your hair and playing with your hair and stuff.
And I kind of got it, but then once it
required the certain detachment, because once my brain kicked in
and said, Christen, you're watching a video in which you're
(08:46):
having to pretend that this woman you don't know is
cutting your hair. This is very strange. I just and
then I just lost it. Yeah, I would imagine as
part of the whole process of relaxing and getting into it.
You really can't be self conscious about it or be
self aware or aware of you know, it's it's definitely
a suspension of disbelief. You kind of just have to
(09:07):
roll with it. But how and when did a SMR
first emerged? Because I feel like it's just sprung up recently,
even though like for you and me both we have
memories of this to go back to our childhood. Well,
it kind of gained traction earlier this century. On October ninete,
two thousand seven, Steady Health Forums member okay whatever posted
(09:31):
a thread titled weird sensation Feels Good, describing a strange,
itchy sensation triggered by several different social interactions and it
kind of grew from there. So in December two thousand eight,
there was a Yahoo group started called Society of Sensationalists.
It was launched with a similar purpose, gaining over thirty
two hundred members in less than three years. Yeah, and
(09:54):
in two thousand and ten, a s MR really went
big time with Hug Your Brain Day, which was partially
organized by Jennifer Allen, who also launched the a s
MR Research and Support website after she coined the term
autonomous sensory Meridian response and a related Facebook group, and
of course who catches onto this but Reddit users um so.
(10:18):
On February two eleven, we have the first a s
MR Reddit discussion board popping up all of this. By
the way, this timeline is coming from no your mame
dot com and I feel like it really hit the
mainstream mainstream on March twenty nine, two thousand thirteen. Earlier
this year, when novelist Andrew Siegel did a This American
(10:40):
Life story about her a s MR triggers. Yeah, and
everything I read comments that I see online people who
are talking about this. Under every article you see about
a s m R or column, people are like, oh
my god, I never knew there was a name for this.
I have felt this, uh since childhood, or I feel
this every day, or you know, I've always wondered and
I just thought everybody had it, or or I thought
(11:01):
I was the only one who had it. And so
it's interesting to watch uh in real time, like the
evolution of this concept, whether it's really medical or not
online as people talk about it. Yeah, that that online
factor has been so important to it. I feel like
if it weren't for discussion boards and Facebook groups and
(11:22):
things like that, we we wouldn't really know about it.
We would still every now and then get a cool
head gasm and be like, oh that was nice, and
I'll get you can't wait from the next haircut. And
that's one of the reasons why a Slate writer referred
to it as this convergence of quote, technology, alienation, and intimacy.
So it's become something that we only thought that we experienced,
(11:44):
but now they're all of these communities who have developed
these little languages around it. Yeah, and part of that language,
I mean you mentioned evokers, Kristen, the people who create
the trigger videos. There are chasers, the people who go
to great links to experience a s m R. So
they might sit on YouTube all day and watch these videos.
There was one video I watched that included fingernail tapping,
(12:08):
rubbing paper together, whispering, and the one that I was like,
I'm turning this off now, she was like dipping her
hands in and out of a bowl of water really fast,
and I was like, that just sounds that sounds chriss um. So, yeah,
these videos are made for chasers. And then we have
asthma's or even as marian's. Who are the people who
experience this condition a s MR? And they really go
(12:31):
out and seek out these videos in the a s
m R community on YouTube, a lot of which are
made by women. Yeah, and and the whole point about
the videos is that it's a way to get a
jolt of a s MR. You know, obviously you can't
go and get a massage or a haircut every day probably, um,
So there's this whole community that has sprung up making
(12:53):
all sorts of videos specifically geared to, you know, set
off off those kinds of head orgasms, the celestial washes
by trying out different triggers like that you were talking about,
the fingernail tapping, the running fingers over hairbrush bristles, things
(13:14):
like that. And like you said, a lot of them
are made by women. And there was an article in
Vice magazine about this and they interviewed Maria, who is
known on YouTube as Gentle Whispering, and she says that
one of the reasons why women make so many of
these videos is that quote, if a guy is in
front of the camera and whispering, there aren't many things
(13:35):
he can do that won't seem creepy, but I mean
by the same token though, the first time I watched one,
because a lot of them are, it's referred to as
a whispering community because a lot of these videos do
involve women. And I'm not going to do this into
the mike right now because I'm sure that would be
kind of off putting for people, but a lot of
the videos are women whispering directly into the mic. And
(13:58):
the first time I send to one and watched one,
I was initially kind of creeped out, but then once
it started sitting off head tingles, I was like, Okay,
this isn't this isn't so bad, It's not so creepy.
They're interesting issues brought up though, of what exactly is
causing it, Like we know what's happening, but why do
(14:19):
we response is strongly to do these whispers feminine whisper
and and a lot of people have brought up the
theory that maybe this is something that reaches back to
our mother's uh Emma a k A. Lush Whispers told
The Independent, maybe it's because of our experience as we
had as children, a mother's voice, a kind teacher, a
friendly optometris because some of those role playing videos are
(14:43):
like you're getting a monologue from the dentist or the optometris,
some professional who has to be very close to your face.
And she says that it can be a mixture of
the sounds and visual stimuli that trigger response. Yeah, in
more formal terms, a slate posture, it's that maybe, Um,
the a SMR videos address a desire to regain some
(15:05):
pre lapse Sarian state of mother child unity. Um, because
there are also a lot of videos that involve um,
these whisperers basically saying like you're gonna be okay, you
work so hard, uh, you know, oh you're sick, let
me take care of you, like very nurturing and coddling
(15:25):
as well. But asmar blogger Heather Feathers Um notes that
there are also plenty of male evokers out there, but
that they deal with some haters on YouTube because a
lot of viewers assume that they won't like hearing a
man in a nurturing role or that it will make
them uncomfortable, kind of like what Maria of Gentle Whispering
(15:47):
said about how you know, if we see a guy
whispering to a camera, it's just automatically going to be creepy.
And I did sheet Heather Feathers that some links to
some male evokers that she liked, and so I watched
one of them and and he was, yeah, it was
still gentle and uh tingly. I mean, I don't think
(16:10):
that you can say that all men evokers would be creepy,
just like I don't think all women evokers are necessarily
un creepy. I think it depends on your video, It
depends on what the person saying, and you're going to
find something creepy that somebody else won't and vice versa.
So well, and this also deals with like how how
we're using the word creepy, you know, for a as
(16:31):
far people who are out there who might be very
much into the whispering community would probably take offense at
that descriptor. But at the end of the day, the
thing is maybe not creepy. But at the end of
the day, it is strange to think about intentionally whispering
into a microphone and maybe slowly opening a bag of
(16:53):
potato chips and eating them very quietly, because that's one
of the triggers for people to that that celephane frankly, Yeah,
but don't crinkle too glad or too fast. That's right,
that's a slow, gentle crinkle. But um, but again, a
s MR community members always want to emphasize that even
though you know you use terms like brain orgasm, headgasm, hairgasm,
(17:18):
it's not a sexual thing, right, It just I mean,
it just feels good, but not necessarily in a sexual way.
I mean, just because something feels good and is relaxing.
I mean, I think that is why people are calling it,
you know, blank gasm. But it definitely does not equate
to an actual orgasm, as people who have had orgasms
(17:40):
could tell you. But I do wonder, though, Caroline, if
at this point people who are listening who are not
familiar with what we're talking about, and we're sitting here
talking about having experienced this, if maybe we sound a
little crazy. I don't know, maybe we do. Well. We're
usually we're usually more skeptical in the side of things,
(18:00):
but once we both started researching this was like, oh, yeah,
we experienced this. But I mean speaking of skepticism though,
like we said at the top of the podcast, when
the term autonomous sensory meridian response a s MR first
popped up online, a lot of people did greeted with skepticism,
and in fact, when someone first created a Wikipedia page
(18:21):
for it, it was promptly taken down because Wicki editors
said that it lacked scientific evidence, although now the page
is back up and there are no flags on it
because I think that it's received enough media attention. And
there are also some researchers looking into who want to
put people who claim to experience a SMR into an
(18:42):
MRI machine so that they can hopefully see what their
brain looks like when it's being triggered, to try to
figure out what's going on. I believe there's a psychologist
at Dartmouth who's doing this. I mean, that's fascinating. I
would love to know the outcome of that. And I
know that that's the kind of stuff that Jen for Alan,
for instance, over at a s MR Research and Support
(19:03):
was really pushing for, like, Okay, this is a feeling
that people have, it's time to research it and see
what's going on. And psychologist Tom Stafford wrote for the
BBC that yeah, you know what, maybe the medical community
just hasn't caught up to people, since people are just
now kind of coming together and saying okay, there are
a lot of us that have felt this, and some
(19:24):
clinicians think that it could be a good thing to
glean more insight into because a lot of people used
it as a form of stress relief through a lot
of people who can't sleep, who can only finally get
to sleep by watching an s MR videos. So they're
wondering if they can see what's going on in the brain,
what kind of pathways that it might be triggering, that
(19:46):
maybe they could apply that to new kinds of therapies,
which could be great um, and a lot of people
have compared it to something like synesthesia, which is a
phenomenon where experiencing one sense results experiencing another one. For instance,
a common one it's called graphine color. It's where letters
(20:06):
might have a color in your brain, or if you
here read a specific word, there's a taste that goes
along with this. There are a lot of musicians in
fact um that have a form of or claim to
have a form of synesthesia where they see music in colors.
And for a long time, kind of like a s
(20:27):
MR synesthesia was written off as just some you know,
trippy whatever, like it wasn't something that people believed actually existed,
but then once the clinical community caught up to it,
they realized that, oh, this is actually something that does
happen in our brains. Yeah. I thought for a minute
when I was reading about that, I was like, oh
(20:48):
my god, I think I have that. And then I
started examining why I thought certain letters were certain colors,
and I was like, oh, no, that's just because of kindergarten,
because like remember your big alphabet charts were like A
was the apple, you know, and BE was like a bumblebee.
I'm like, oh, that's because red apple, And that's why
I think A is red. And so when you hear bees,
(21:09):
are they always yellow and black stripe? Yeah? Apparently, I guess.
I don't know, but I realized, no, Caroline, you're not
that special. It's just so stop reaching for all of
these weird brain cross wiring conditions. But yeah, speaking of
the cross wiring, though, some wonder whether a s MR
is just the result of that in which a trigger
(21:31):
like watching Bob Ross paint his happy trees is stimulating
a particular brain regions. Some also think that it's related
to serotonin release that sets off all of those calming,
happy feelings because you can't hit a ceiling with it,
like some of the One of the reasons why you
they're the term chaser exists is because if you watch
(21:56):
a lot of a s MR videos, you can almost
get a s m R out. It's almost as though
the brain can develop a tolerance for it, so it
needs to kind of reset. So it's kind of addictive,
kind of satisfying some need and you need more of it,
so it's like like mental crack. Yeah, but I I really,
(22:17):
I really wish that I could go into an MRI machine.
I want to know what's going on in my brain
now that there's language to go with it. I'm I'm
curious to see. And also knowing that there are these
videos that are out there to trigger them, I'm really
curious to know. Um. And also, I mean, if there
(22:40):
are any guys out there who make these videos, I'm
curious to know, because there is. I mean, it does
seem like it's overwhelmingly dominated by women. Like what is
it about those soft female voices, because I know exactly
the type of voice that they're talking about where it's
like almost Terry gross, but not it's not quite Terry gross.
(23:04):
Terry Gross is too like high pitched and nasally for
me and like creaky host of fresh air. Oh, I
don't know. I enjoy it, but it's not a smr ish.
I don't know. Um. I'm hoping though that listeners who
know what we're talking about right in, let us know
your triggers. Let's know, if you watch these videos, if
(23:25):
you've made these videos. Also let us know if you
think that we are cuckoo and you have no idea,
because I wonder if that is a different brain wiring too,
If there why would there not be some kind of
relaxation trigger. But also if you, you know, if you
really think that you have an experience that maybe you
need to do what I didn't think back to when
(23:46):
you were like seven and be like, oh right, hair
braiding made me just want to fall asleep in the library.
So maybe you need to, uh, you know, have go
get your hair braided like once a month or something.
It's a port with therapy. All the girls in the
office are like in a hair braiding circle. It's like
it's the three o'clock slump. We've got to do something,
(24:06):
do something to calm down. The bosses are really breathing
down my neck. Um, But yeah, right into us about
a s m R. If you will. Mom Stuff at
Discovery dot com is where you can send your emails.
You can tweet us at mom Stuff podcast, or send
us a message on Facebook. And we got a couple
of letters to read for you right when we get
(24:27):
back from a quick break. And now back to our letters, Kristen,
I have one here from Jamie. She was writing in
about our women's college episode. She says, I just recently
graduated from Mount Holyoke, which we were always told was
the first women's college in the country, and I identify
as transgender, specifically trans masculine slash gender queer. I am female,
(24:50):
assigned at birth and identified as trans before I entered
Mount Holyoke and was looking forward to being in an
environment that would allow issues such as trans issues to
be more relevant and potentially safer than co ed colleges.
The semester before I graduated, I and a few other faculty,
alums and professors in the area who identify as trans,
as well as our president, Lynn Pascarella, spoke on the
(25:11):
issue of trans spoke at all women's colleges. You might
notice a lot of trans men at women's colleges. Actually,
the issue is trans women. It gets really messy, especially
with Title nine. And while I think anyone who's not
assist gender male should be able to apply at a
women's college, I quite frankly think that trans women belong
at women's colleges such as Mount Holyoke more than I did.
(25:34):
There is a lot of work to be done gender
neutral bathrooms, ending extreme amounts of essentialists and transphobic language
and actions, and just all around equality and anti oppression.
I really really loved Mount Holyoke and got an incredible
education and made relationships with students, faculty, et cetera that
I think will last me a lifetime. Also, being a
part of the five college consortition was great. While I
(25:55):
can't speak about being straight at a woman's college, I
did meet lots of guys at all the schools, some
which became my best friend. Anyway, I had a great
time at Mount Holyoke, and I'm really happy that Trances
she was a being talked about so widely in all
types of conversations. So thank you, Jamie Well. I've got
an email here from Alessandra about women's colleges. She is
currently a senior at Barnard Whoop Whoop, one of the
(26:19):
Seven Sisters schools, and she writes, I was originally among
the ninety seven percent of high school girls whom you
quoted who would not consider attending a woman's college. I
had never heard of Barnard and checked it out on
a whim because my father really wanted me to. I
remember sitting down with two students and asking specifically about
the lack of boys, God forbid. These girls explained to
(26:40):
me that because of Barnard's unique relationship with Columbia University,
many of their classes did have boys, and they took
several of their core curriculum classes across the street at
the co ed school. Plus they said, it's New York,
there are plenty of boys, and so my fears were assuaged,
and I was even committed to applying early decision to
Barnard as my top joys. However, to my high school friends,
I continue to qualify my decision with statements like, oh,
(27:03):
it's not really in all women convent or anything, because
I was the only girl in the living memory of
my high school to even apply to a women's college,
and I definitely felt socially judged. Three years have gone
by since receiving my decision letter, and I no longer
feel awkward or compromising over my women's college choice. In fact,
more than any other part of college, the all women
(27:23):
component has been the most influential and educational to me. True,
it's not for everyone, and true I still encounter many
negative stereotypes from other college students when they hear I
to know women's college. However, I have found the opportunities
and experiences that I've been exposed to as a result
of my single sex education have played an invaluable informative
role in making me the capable and empowered feminist go
getter that I am today. Ps I recommend your podcast,
(27:46):
all my phones and all that well. Thank you, Alessandra,
and good luck finishing up at Barnard. It is an
impressive school to go too, and thanks to everybody who's
written in on seven. Discovery dot com is our email address.
You can follow us on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast,
and you can hit us up on Facebook as well.
Like us while you're at it, and we're also on
Tumbler at stuff mom never told you dot tumbler dot com,
(28:10):
and don't forget that we are on YouTube as well
if you want to see our faces you can head
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