Misophonia, a disorder characterized by intense negative emotions, such as anger or anxiety, in response to certain everyday noises, affects nearly one in five adults.
- Misophonia is a disorder characterized by strong negative emotions related to the perception of everyday noises.
- According to a study, 18% of adults living in the UK suffer from misophonia.
- The website handicap.fr estimates that 15% of French people are affected by this disorder.
When a person chews or sniffs, it makes sounds that are intolerable to some people. They suffer from misophonia, a disorder characterized by strong negative emotions, such as anger or anxiety, linked to certain everyday sounds.
Misophonia, a common disorder
A study, published in the journal PLOShighlights that one in five adults suffer from misophonia. To arrive at this result, the scientists surveyed 768 people living in the United Kingdom. The average age of the participants was 46.4 years. Of these, only 13.6% were aware of the term “misophonia” before the study, with 2.3% identifying themselves as suffering from the disorder.
Participants were asked to answer several questions about everyday sounds and rate their emotional response and intensity on a 10-point scale. At the same time, they were also asked to indicate how these noises affected their lives, how they perceived themselves, and how their personal and professional relationships were affected. Finally, the scientists developed threshold scores for symptoms.
An intolerance to everyday noises
Based on this data, the researchers found that 18% of the study participants had serious symptoms of misophonia. This is because some people feel trapped and helpless when they hear common noises and cannot get away from them, and many feel guilty about these reactions.
“It is important that our study found that one in five people in the UK experience significant misophonia reactions, but only a small proportion were aware of the term, explains Silia Vitoratou, one of the authors of the study. This means that most people with misophonia do not have a term to describe what they experience. Our team is working hard to (…) provide clinicians with the tools they need to understand and effectively assess misophonia.”
“Misophonia is much more than being irritated by certain sounds”
The researchers point out that the results of a survey conducted in the United Kingdom do not apply to all countries and cultures.Our survey measured the complexity of the disease, says Jane Gregory, another author of the study. Misophonia is more than just being annoyed by certain sounds, it’s feeling trapped or helpless when you can’t get away from those sounds and miss things because of it. It’s feeling like there’s something wrong with you in the way you react to sounds, but also feeling like there’s nothing you can do about it. It can be such a relief to discover that you’re not alone, that other people react to sounds in the same way.”
According to the site handicap.fr15% of French people suffer from misophonia.
