This is not a metaphor-this is literally what TikTok user tastes when she listens to the internet personality belt out a tune. In a February 2015 article for the Psychologist, Jack Dutton looked at research that found that people with chromaesthesia are more likely to engage with creative pursuits and play instruments, which would explain the long list of artists with that specific neurological profile.James Charles’ singing voice tastes like $5 vodka in a plastic bottle. But science is getting closer to finding an answer, and if it does nail down the process, it could prove to be a game changer for music education. How exactly children learn sound-color synesthesia, and why some children retain the ability and some don't, remains a mystery. Another 2014 study from the University of Sussex reviewed a 1944 study in which researchers successfully taught listeners to create sound-color synesthesia connections. Colizoli trained a group of participants to associate colors with specific letters to simulate a grapheme-color synesthesia (one of the most common forms) by having participants read passages where specific letters were colored. A 2014 study performed by Olympia Colizoli of University of Amsterdam supports this hypothesis to a certain extent. They proposed that synesthesia may be learned and arise from childhood memories. But, then, what could be the nature of synesthesia?' 'If none of the proposed structural or functional differences confirmed,' they write, according to Discover, 'this would speak against synesthesia being a neurological condition. Learning to see sound. In March 2015, neurologists Jean-Michel Hupé and Michel Dojat studied the brain scans of synesthetes and found no evidence of any structural differences in their brains. Researchers out of the University of London and the University of Oxford argued that the development of adult synesthesia is 'better explained by their being learned' than by erroneously pruned connections. Neonatal theory has been criticized in recent years, though, as has all research that frames synesthesia as a neurological disorder. By that logic, we all may be synesthetes until we grow out of it. In fact, the brains of infant primates show evidence that their senses are all a hyperconnective blend until a few weeks or months after birth. Simultaneously triggered senses are examples of the brain making excess neurological connections or failing to prune existing connections. The auditory cortex, where music and sound are first processed, is close to the occipital lobe, where the brain distinguishes color and shape. Early research suggested that synesthesia was simply a case of crossed mental wires. Scientists largely declined to study synesthesia until around the 1980s, when MRIs suggested there was a legitimate neurological basis for the feeling. Several artists, like Melissa McCracken, even put what they see onto canvas.Įarly research.

His tone colors are markedly different from those Pharrell describes, which points to a fundamental truth about synesthesia: Every artist's color associations and experiences with the condition are different. Last November, he gave a TED talk describing his process of writing music using his synesthetic connections. Indie pop crooner Dev Hynes has been very open about his synesthesia.

'They'd think, 'If I tell people that I have this gift, maybe they'll think that all the practicing I've done doesn't mean anything.''īut the sting of that stigma has lessened recently, replaced by a fascination. 'People were very afraid to admit they had it because they didn't want people to think that this special gift was the sole basis for their talent,' Carol Steen, co-founder of the American Synesthesia Association, told Pitchfork. In some artists' cases, they feared it would invalidate their actual musical talents. Disorder or eccentricity? For years, synesthesia has suffered the stigma of being a mental ' disorder.' Throughout the years, many synesthetes remained silent about their gifts.

Synthesia disease