Synesthesia: the Mixing of Senses
by Min Sullivan
Introduction (explanation and examples):
Is it possible for a person’s senses to become seemingly ‘mixed up’, intertwined? Surprisingly, it is! A neurological condition, known as synesthesia, can make a person be able to see pain, hear a color, etc. They might be able to feel a voice, or taste and smell a word. Different parts of the brain are involved with synesthesia.
Body (word ‘synesthesia’, not-a-disease, and Kandinsky):
The word synesthesia is from the Greek ‘syn’, meaning ‘together’, and ‘anesthesia’, meaning ‘sensation’. Scientists used to doubt that synesthesia is real. However, experiments show that is a real condition. Synesthesia is not a disease. It is completely harmless. Some people with synesthesia actually use their synesthesia to help them remember things, like Daniel Tammet, who was able to perfectly recite 22,514 digits of mathematical pi. Wassily Kandinsky, one of the first painters of abstract art, used his chromosthesia (colored hearing) to create his paintings! His colors had sounds, and his sounds had colors. He would paint his pictures by listening to the sounds his paint colors made, until the paints went quiet.
Body (synesthetic triggers):
In synesthesia, one sense triggers another, and then the experience occurs. For example, someone who has synesthesia might see a color and then hear a sound, or vice versa, like Kandinsky. The sound triggers the color, and it happens very fast. A certain trigger will always make certain senses intertwine. Whatever the synesthetic experience is, it is consistent for the synesthete’s (person with synesthesia’s) entire life.
Body (synesthesia types):
No one knows how many different types of synesthesia there are. Some scientists estimate that there are more than 150 different types! We have five senses (taste, smell, touch, sight, hearing), and with the pairings of those alone you find 20 different types of synesthesia. A color, perhaps, might trigger a sound (this type of synesthesia is called chromesthesia). However, synesthesia can involve more than just the five senses. For example, motion might trigger a sound. Things having personalities (letters, objects, shapes, etc.) is a common kind of synesthesia. Ordinal-linguistic synesthesia is what it’s called when numbers have personalities. Emotions may have tastes, and/or smells (part of lexical-gustatory synesthesia). Different degrees of pain (cut, sprain, break) might have different colors. Days the week, months, and years being mapped out by a synesthete is also another kind of synesthesia (called spacial sequence, or number form if it’s with numbers). Spacial sequence is a very common type of synesthsia. All these different types really add up.
Having types of synesthesia that have to do with colors is pretty common in the world of synesthetes. Spacial sequence (mentioned above) is a popular type of synesthesia. There are other kinds of synesthesia as well, such as mirror-touch synesthesia (when a synesthete feels the pain of someone else as if they were the ones in pain) and emotion-color synesthesia (colors for different emotions). A common type of synesthesia is grapheme-color synesthesia. A synesthete with grapheme-color synesthesia might have letters and numbers tinted or saturated with color. Five might be a bright blue, and ‘h’ might be green. Although grapheme-color synesthetes don’t always share the same colors for their numbers and letters, a color for a certain number or letter may be common. For example, the letter ‘a’ is commonly red for synesthetes.
Body (scientific theories):
Scientists are not sure what happens in the brain with synesthesia, although they have some theories. One theory is that synesthetes have pathways between different parts of the brain that non-synesthetes don’t have. Another theory is that synesthetes and non-synesthetes both have the same brain pathways, but that some of the non-synesthetes’ brain pathways are blocked, while those pathways are unblocked for synesthetes.
Body (females vs. males concerning synesthesia):
One out of every 2,000 people has synesthesia. Females have synesthesia more than males (a 6:1 ratio). Even more interesting is the fact that synesthetes are more commonly left-handed than right-handed. It is also quite common for a synesthete to be creative, too. People with synesthesia are usually intelligent beyond the average intelligence. Scientists think that having synesthesia is generic. Some scientists think that children may become synesthetic before they are four months old. Synesthetic children don’t usually recognize what they have; rather, others may notice.
Body (synesthesia tests):
There are tests that people can take to see if they have synesthesia or not. True synesthetes do not have to make an effort to have their synesthetic experiences. It just comes naturally, and is always involuntary, automatic, and consistent. There are timed tests, so that people can’t fake having synesthesia (with a real synesthete it would not take a long time to have one thing trigger another so that the synesthete can have the synesthetic experience).
Conclusion:
So, do you (or do you not) have synesthesia? Do you have experience any of the types of synesthesia described earlier? If so, are your perhaps synesthetic experiences always consistent (and involuntary, as was being talked about above)? If your answer is yes, you just might be that one synesthetic person for every 19,999 non-synesthes. If you would like, you can take some synesthesia tests to find out!
To sum it all up, synesthesia is, well, different. Hard to explain. Confusing. But it seems like it would really enrich and brighten the life of any synesthete. Whether you are a synesthete or not (or whether you know one or not), synesthesia is a very interesting topic to learn about and research.
Bibliography:
by Rosenstock, Barb. The Noisy Paintbox Random House, Inc., copyright 2014
by Saab, Carl Y. Seeing, Hearing, and Smelling the World Chelsea House Publishers, copyright 2007
