Brain massage and training with noise: what is the phenomenon of ASMR?

And why many people are willing to listen to rustling noises for hours.
There are many videos on YouTube that may seem strange: girls combing their hair, whispering something indistinctly, knocking on objects and crunching their food. This phenomenon is called ASMR massage, or coaching.

What is ASMR blogging?
Without getting too deep into neuropsychology, ASMR is the sensation of a head massage and goosebumps from watching or listening to a video with tactile, visual or auditory triggers. Two types of stimuli are most often talked about:

Auditory – sounds, tapping, timbre of voice, specific manner of speech;
Visual – smooth movements, gestures, interactions with objects.
It is worth specifying that the ASMR reaction occurs in people who are cared for. Otherwise, such triggers cause irritation and negative emotions.

ASMR reactions can be produced by touch, rain noise, and bubbles bursting on the film. The recording uses highly sensitive microphones, so noises that pass our attention in normal life relax us in this case. Videos with combs, glass glasses, pencils get millions of views because the sounds they make give us goosebumps and help us catch zen. That’s why you want to watch them over and over again.

Most ASMR bloggers are women. This is explained by the fact that a woman’s voice sounds softer and gentler and evokes associations with the image of a mother taking care of her child. Women artists like to call themselves psychologists with no education.

The goal of the ASMR rollers is to relax the user as much as possible and achieve a state of gentle euphoria. In fact, it is similar to listening to quiet, melodic music with certain tones that promote relaxation, meditative music, or meditation itself.

Regular viewing of clips gives an effect similar to meditative practice: anxiety decreases, psycho-emotional stability appears, and irritability decreases. Birdsong, water noise, white noise, sounds of cars and trains soothe – this fact has been known for a long time. It’s just that this knowledge has been popularized by means of videos, and bloggers use all kinds of ways of presenting content to increase views.