Hearing Things?

[Whitehouse]

     Ever since I was young I have experienced the phenomenon of hearing things that aren't actually there but instead are familiar sounds. For example, the earliest sound i can recall is the jingle from the Pokemon red, blue, and yellow games. I would distinctly hear it for a long time even after i had stopped playing, sometimes completely at random. This is not the type of thing where i would hear it in my head like when someone gets a song stuck in their head, this is me ACTUALLY HEARING it. More recently, some common sounds are of my phone vibrating or the lil POP u hear when u get a facebook IM.

Basically, I was wondering if anyone experiences a similar phenomenon, knows why it occurs, or knows what it is called.... NOT INSANITY -_-.

[p0ppin]

I've heard about people having "phantom vibrations" from their cellphones - feeling it go off when, in reality, it didn't.  Also of amputees feeling tingling sensations in their limbs after they have been removed.  Maybe this is somewhat the same.  If you are accustomed to hearing a sound often, you might start hearing it even when its not there.

Or you might be going crazy, who knows?

[iDante]

I have some sounds wired into my brain from my childhood. Especially songs. For instance, ever now and then a song that my mom used to play will send me careening back to when I was 6 years old and was playing Link's Awakening. I can remember exactly the place that I was at.

That's completely normal though.

I think what's happening to you is you're hearing things similar to what you think they are, and you're just connecting them to things from your past that you have started forgetting the sounds of. Sounds like a good excuse to rip out the 'ole pokemon games and start playing.

[Baoden]

Yeah, p0ppin, I get those ghost texts all the time. I've even heard it ring when I wasn't actually being called, like the familiar sounds that the OP's talking about.

Also, this is a little off topic, but I've been gaming so much that I've unconsciously "trained" myself to react to any sort of beep (In almost every game I've played a beep meant something significant, like low health) and if I say, hear my alarm clock go off, I jump, trying to assess what's going on.

[The Epic Guy]

speaking of alarm clocks, i thought i turned mine off this morning, and it went off when i was in the shower, so i get out to turn it off. after that i got back in and i keep hearing it go off, even though it didnt.

it might be happening to me.

[p0ppin]

Does this happen to anyone else?:  Like when an alarm clock goes off in a TV show or movie, I get REALLY annoyed at it, the sound just gets to me terribly, and it sucks because the person doesn't turn it off for like 30 beeps

[Whitehouse]

I've heard about people having "phantom vibrations" from their cellphones - feeling it go off when, in reality, it didn't.  Also of amputees feeling tingling sensations in their limbs after they have been removed.  Maybe this is somewhat the same.  If you are accustomed to hearing a sound often, you might start hearing it even when its not there.

Or you might be going crazy, who knows?

Yeah that's EXACTLY what i was talking about, I can feel it and hear it vibrate but when i look nothing really happened.

speaking of alarm clocks, i thought i turned mine off this morning, and it went off when i was in the shower, so i get out to turn it off. after that i got back in and i keep hearing it go off, even though it didnt.

it might be happening to me.

That's exactly the kind of thing that will happen to me. I hear a noise, and then later on I will almost certainly be hearing it in my ears but no one else hears a thing.

I think what's happening to you is you're hearing things similar to what you think they are, and you're just connecting them to things from your past that you have started forgetting the sounds of. Sounds like a good excuse to rip out the 'ole pokemon games and start playing.

Mmh good thought but no. Its not like I'm hearing something and relate it to something else, I can UNMISTAKEABLY hear the noise and yet there isn't any kinda of noise going on at all.

Anyone know a medical term for this? I'd like to know why it happens.

[Godefroy]

Does this happen to anyone else?:  Like when an alarm clock goes off in a TV show or movie, I get REALLY annoyed at it, the sound just gets to me terribly, and it sucks because the person doesn't turn it off for like 30 beeps

I fucking hate that.

[a-4-year-old]

Once I was asleep when my alarm clock went off (weird) but instead of waking up I spent five minutes dreaming that I was in a store when a security alarm went off and nobody did anything about it. I began getting angry at the management until I was so annoyed by the sound that I woke up.

And thats the most angry I've ever been upon waking up.

[The Epic Guy]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_effect

interesting stuff...

when an alarm clock goes off

i hate the sound of alarm clocks, especially the buzzer variety. i should get a radio alarm clock.

[Lord Frunkamunch]

Does this happen to anyone else?:  Like when an alarm clock goes off in a TV show or movie, I get REALLY annoyed at it, the sound just gets to me terribly, and it sucks because the person doesn't turn it off for like 30 beeps

I used the alarm clock feature on my nintendo DS for a month or two before it started grating on me. Now whenever I hear that particular beeping it drives me crazy. I've linked that already somewhat annoying sound with the unpleasant experience of waking up early. When someone else's alarm goes off I get more and more pissed off the longer it sounds, as if the person with the alarm should already know about my hatred of that tone.

[SadistAtHeart]

The other day, I put on a song that begins very subtly with some light ambient noise and guitar tapping. I was enjoying listening to it, but the volume seem a tad low, so I made my way back to the computer only to find that the speakers were actually off.

[UnknownSniper]

Does this happen to anyone else?:  Like when an alarm clock goes off in a TV show or movie, I get REALLY annoyed at it, the sound just gets to me terribly, and it sucks because the person doesn't turn it off for like 30 beeps

You'd be surprised how annoyed I get from dumb sounds like that, or people coughing, tapping their feet, sniffling, the dog scratching at the door, dog barking, dog scratching and her leg hitting the porch floor.....

[Sir Jeremy]

The other day, I put on a song that begins very subtly with some light ambient noise and guitar tapping. I was enjoying listening to it, but the volume seem a tad low, so I made my way back to the computer only to find that the speakers were actually off.

LOL

Haven't really experienced stuff like this myself though. 

..God is watching you!

[PANZERCATWAGON]

you guys are all nuts

you all need head doctors

[~Niko~]

this... doesn't happens to me... what's wrong with you guys?

[echo_trail]

you guys are all nuts

you all need head doctors

Enter Panzerkampfwagon! 

[pavliko]

ye i have something strange too..
i can hear the sound of when my mirc connects or someone pm's me on mirc this is nuts...

[Wolf_Man]

Its just white noise. I have it too.

[Kerrazyeye]

Yeah I get that phone vibrating/tone thing too.... I play music in my head all the time, right now I'm tuned into the chorus of Metallica - I Disappear :/