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Related Experiment Videos

Hearing of a presence.

Olaf Blanke1, Stéphanie Ortigue, Alessandra Coeytaux

  • 1Functional Brain Mapping Laboratory, Geneva University Hospital, Geneva, Switzerland. olaf.blanke@hcuge.ch

Neurocase
|August 20, 2003
PubMed
Summary

Epilepsy patients may experience auditory hallucinations of a nearby person due to brain damage. This hearing disturbance is linked to spatial perception deficits and somatognosia disorders.

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Area of Science:

  • Neurology
  • Neuroscience
  • Auditory Perception

Background:

  • Epilepsy can arise from localized brain damage.
  • Parieto-temporal lobe damage is associated with complex neurological symptoms.

Observation:

  • A patient with epilepsy secondary to left parieto-temporal brain damage reported paroxysmal auditory hallucinations.
  • These hallucinations involved hearing a person in her near extrapersonal space.
  • The patient also exhibited deficits in spatial auditory perception and somatognosia.

Findings:

  • The paroxysmal auditory experience of hearing a person nearby was directly associated with spatial auditory perception deficits.
  • These symptoms suggest a link between auditory hallucinations and disorders of body schema (somatognosia).

Implications:

  • This case suggests that auditory hallucinations of a person nearby may represent a specific type of auditory somatognosia disorder.
  • Understanding these phenomena can improve diagnosis and treatment for epilepsy patients with complex sensory disturbances.

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