If you’ve ever felt haunted by something out of this world, you’re far from alone. However, research today can provide mundane, if deeply creepy, explanations for some of these encounters with the supernatural.
Canadian scientists exposed volunteers to low-frequency sounds normally inaudible to the human ear, also known as infrasound. The researchers reported that compared to control subjects, people exposed to infrasound felt more nervous and experienced higher levels of cortisol, an indicator of stress. The study’s findings suggest that hidden infrasound sources may be the reason why the heebie-jeebies are often associated with reported haunted locations, researchers say.
Lead study author Rodney Schmaltz, a professor of psychology at MacEwan University, told Gizmodo: “It’s important to be clear that infrasound doesn’t make people believe they’re seeing ghosts. What it can do is cause inexplicable anxiety that some people might associate with ghosting or hallucinations.”
Sound of hauntings?
YouGov survey was released Last October (just in time for Halloween, of course) it found that 60% of Americans believe they’ve experienced at least one paranormal event in their lifetime. The most common otherworldly experience at 35% was “sensing a presence or unknown energy.”
There are many stories behind the most famous ghost images full bed. Some people’s paranormal experiences can only show how much they agree with the idea that an old house or a dark basement can be haunted. However, there are places in the world where it is always easy to sense creeps. Instead of dismissing all hallucinations as figments of human imagination, some scientists have tried to look for answers that are still grounded in reality as we know it, including infrasound.
Infrasound is defined as sound at or below 20 hertz. We cannot normally perceive infrasound, although high-intensity infrasound can still be physically felt as pressure or vibration. People sometimes report feeling uneasy around infrasound, which has led some researchers to learn Although with some, it can explain some hauntings mixed results.
There’s Schmaltz and his team previously investigated potential effects of infrasound in notable fearful locations. But this time they recruited 36 participants for a more controlled laboratory experiment. All volunteers were instructed to sit in a room while listening to either soothing or creepy music. Half of the volunteers were also dosed with infrasound (18 hertz) provided by hidden subwoofers. Before and after the session, their cortisol levels were measured with a saliva sample and their mood was studied. After the experiment, they were asked if they felt infrasound in their room.
Overall, infrasound listeners reported, on average, more irritability and disinterest during and after the music session than non-infrasound listeners, and their salivary cortisol levels increased more. They also tended to rate any music played during the experiment as sadder.
“One detail worth noting is that none of this depended on whether or not people had infrasound on. When participants were asked at the end of the session whether they believed they had been exposed, their answers were no better than guessing, and their beliefs did not predict their mood or cortisol responses,” he said. “Thus, the effects we saw were not driven by people consciously noticing and responding to the stimulus.”
These were the team’s findings has been published Monday in the journal Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience.
What will happen next?
The researchers acknowledge that the study’s sample size was small, although the findings were consistent under various sensitivity analyses is used to measure how strong the results of the study will be).
Meanwhile, other studies have supported the idea that infrasound can enhance our sense of the creepy. For example, the famous experiment of psychologist Richard Wiseman and others in 2002 has been exposed to Hundreds of concertgoers in London linked the silent notes of infrasound to certain songs. People were then 22% more likely to report “unusual experiences” such as a pit in the stomach during infrasound songs.
The researchers see their work as one of the first steps toward understanding how infrasound can affect the human body, even outside of allegedly haunted houses.
Low-frequency sound is common in everyday life. Ventilation systems, furnaces, heavy traffic, large appliances and industrial equipment can all create these,” Schmaltz said. “If even modest exposure to infrared can skew our moods and raise cortisol without people noticing, that’s potentially relevant for any environment where these sources are present for long periods of time.”
The researchers hope that they or others can conduct larger and more complex studies that better explain the effects of infrasound on the body. This might involve, for example, playing more low-frequency sounds for longer periods of time. real world sources. And they’re already working on another study looking at whether famous haunted locations have higher background infrasound levels than similar non-haunted buildings.
Meanwhile, perhaps some people will take solace in the possibility that their past run-ins with the supernatural were neither paranormal nor entirely in their heads.
“None of this replaces other explanations for reported hallucinations. Expectation and misperception play a key role in why a person might report a fearful experience. So, infrasound may be another ingredient in the mix,” Schmaltz said. “For people who are inclined to interpret a strange feeling as evidence of existence, it is enough to show an uncertain moment for an imaginary explanation.”
