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Synesthesia

Synesthesia

Synesthesia is a remarkable condition where stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. People with synesthesia experience a blending or crossing of their senses, such as sight and sound, leading to cross-modal sensations. In this condition, the stimulation of one sense, such as hearing a number or musical note, triggers an experience of another sense, like sensing a specific color, taste, or smell. People...

Introduction to Special Senses

Introduction to Special Senses

Sensory receptors play an integral part in comprehending our external and internal environments. They receive diverse stimuli, converting them into the nervous system's electrochemical signals. This conversion occurs as the stimulus alters the sensory neuron's cell membrane potential, instigating the generation of an action potential. This action potential is subsequently transmitted to the central nervous system (CNS), which integrates with other sensory data or higher cognitive functions.

Tactile and Chemical Senses

Tactile and Chemical Senses

Tactile senses encompass touch, temperature, and pain, each mediated by specific receptors. Touch receptors detect mechanical energy or pressure against the skin. Sensory fibers from these receptors enter the spinal cord and relay information to the brain stem. Here, most fibers cross over to the opposite side of the brain. The touch information then moves to the thalamus, which projects a map of the body's surface onto the somatosensory areas of the parietal lobes in the cerebral cortex. This...

Sensory Modalities

Sensory Modalities

Sensation typically is the process by which the sensory receptors and sense organs detect stimuli from the internal and external environment and transmit this information to the central nervous system for processing.
General senses refer to the broad category of sensory information detected by receptors in the body and can be further grouped into somatic and visceral senses. Somatic sensations include touch, pressure, temperature, and pain and are essential for navigating our environment and...

Color Vision

Color Vision

Color perception begins in the retina, the light-sensitive layer at the back of the eye. Two main theories explain how colors are seen: the trichromatic theory and the opponent-process theory. The trichromatic theory, proposed by Thomas Young in 1802 and extended by Hermann von Helmholtz in 1852, suggests that color vision is based on three types of cone receptors in the retina. These cones are sensitive to different but overlapping ranges of wavelengths corresponding to red, blue, and green.

Extrasensory Perception

Extrasensory Perception

Extrasensory perception, or ESP, suggests the ability to perceive events beyond the conventional senses of sight, hearing, and touch. Parapsychologists, who research ESP and related psychic phenomena, categorize ESP into three main types: precognition, telepathy, and clairvoyance.
Precognition involves foreseeing future events, such as predicting an accident before it happens. An example of precognition could be someone dreaming about a specific event, like a car crash, which then occurs...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 20, 2026

Training Synesthetic Letter-color Associations by Reading in Color

Training Synesthetic Letter-color Associations by Reading in Color

Published on: February 20, 2014

Synesthesia.

¹School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9QH United Kingdom. jamiew@sussex.ac.uk

Annual Review of Psychology

|July 4, 2012

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Synesthesia, a condition where senses intertwine, is increasingly understood through empirical study. Research reveals its characteristics, causes like genetics, and its impact on cognition, creativity, and numeracy.

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Cognitive Psychology
Human Perception

Background:

Synesthesia has been documented for 200 years.
Recent empirical research has significantly advanced understanding of its mechanisms.
This review synthesizes current knowledge on synesthesia's characteristics, causes, and cognitive influences.

Purpose of the Study:

To review the defining characteristics of synesthesia, including its automaticity and phenomenology.
To explore the underlying causes of synesthesia, encompassing genetic factors and neural mechanisms.
To examine developmental synesthesia as a cognitive individual difference and its effects on various domains.

Main Methods:

Literature review synthesizing empirical studies on synesthesia.
Analysis of characteristics: elicitation, automaticity, prevalence, consistency, and phenomenology.
Examination of etiological factors: genetic influences and neural mechanisms for developmental synesthesia, and plasticity in acquired synesthesia.

Main Results:

Synesthesia is characterized by automatic, consistent, and elicited sensory experiences.
Causes include genetic variations in developmental synesthesia and neural plasticity in acquired forms.
Developmental synesthesia influences perception, imagery, memory, creativity, and numeracy.

Conclusions:

Substantial progress has been made in empirically studying synesthesia.
Synesthesia represents an individual difference in cognition with broad impacts.
Further research continues to elucidate the neural and cognitive underpinnings of synesthesia.