SYNESTHETIC PERCEPTION OF TEMPERATURE AND SOUND DURING NUMERICAL PROCESSING
Journal Title: Acta Neuropsychologica - Year 2015, Vol 13, Issue 2
Abstract
Background: Synesthesia is a phenomenon found in some individuals wherein a particular sensory stimulus generates a secondary response which is seemingly immaterial to the initial stimulus. This was once believed to be an extremely rare occurrence but in recent years, numerous scientific reports of various forms of synesthesia have emerged. It is most likely that a trait that is retained throughout the course of evolution provides certain benefits to the individual. Subject PP, a 39-year-old mathematics teacher reported that temperatures and/or sounds were frequently evoked during her processing of numbers and operations. We propose that sy nesthesia may be employed by PP to help in the processing of numbers and mathematical computations.Case study: PP was first interviewed by the researchers after she was discovered to be a synesthete. In our experiment, she was presented with notecards containing numbers and operations and was asked to report concurrent perceptions of temperature and sounds in each case. Composite numbers induced a higher average temperature response (7.30 +/- 1.83 units) compared to prime numbers (5.41 +/- 2.92 units; two-tailed t-test with unequal variances, p<0.001). Sounds, which may be mentally perceived or physically uttered, were induced more frequently by operations (26%) than by numbers (2%).Conclusions: We conclude that the mathematical property of PP is correlated to the way her synesthetic concurrent is expressed and we propose that synesthesia may be employed by PP to help in the processing of numbers and mathematical computations.
Authors and Affiliations
Sabina Dang, Chui Sien Chan
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP77295
- DOI -
- Views 126
- Downloads 0
Cognitive impairment in hospitalized adolescent girls suffering from anorexia and bulimia nervosa
The purpose of our study was to assess cognitive functions in adolescent inpatients with eating disorders, as the issue remains controversial. We used the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the Digit Span Test to assess wor...
STRATEGIES FOR COPING WITH STRESS URINARY INCONTINENCE IN WOMEN
[b]SUMMARY[/b]Urinary incontinence during intercourse occurs in 10-56% of women suffering from urinary incontinence. Many strategies are used to cope with this problem. We investigated the impact of urinary incontinence...
RISK PREFERENCE IN PATIENTS WITH OBSTRUCTIVE SLEEP APNOEA SYNDROME IS MODULATED BY THE GAIN OR LOSS CONTEXT
The aim of the present study was to assess the propensity for risk taking among patients with obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome by means of a single-outcome gambling task that involved actual monetary losses and gains.<b...
NEUROPSYCHOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES OF CHILD ABUSE AND NEGLECT
The most dangerous kind of abuse is family violence. It occurs in the contextof a relationship of intimacy, kinship, trust and dependency, and mayhave physical, mental, or sexual forms. Family violence can take the form...
REPETITIVE TRANSCRANIAL MAGNETIC STIMULATION (RTMS): A USEFUL TOOL ALSO FOR PATIENTS SUFFERING FROM DYSLEXIA?
[b]SUMMARY[/b]Wanzek &amp; Vaughn (2008) have reported that improve-ment of reading fluency depends on the amount of time in reading inten/ention. For that reason it can be assumed that brain stimulation - psychologi...