https://www.elle.com.au/health-fitness/asmr-sleep-8611
Right this minute, thousands of people are watching a YouTube video of a woman stroking a boar-bristle hairbrush. Or she's flipping through an electronics catalogue. Or simulating an eye exam. It feels good, but not in a laptop-above, hands-below-the-doona way–this online community is tapping into the relaxationbenefits of a buzzy phenomenon called ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response), which is gaining a cult-following thanks to its potential to relieve anxiety and sleep disorders. Characterised by waves of pleasant tingles that typically start in the head and work through the body (like goosebumps in HD), it's a sensation triggered by aural and/or visual stimuli.
With more than 2.8 million videos on YouTube posted by self-proclaimed "ASMRtists" (the suppliers of said tingles), there's no shortage of choices, but what flicks your sensory switch can differ dramatically from person to person. The most common triggers include whispered show-and-tells of objects (from makeup to comic books), methodical folding of everyday items (paper and towels) and even attentive role-play (think suit fittings and haircuts). Personally, nothing transports me to a zen-like state faster than the touching of textured surfaces. I'm not fussy; crinkle a bit of plastic or lightly trace the surface of a book with a nail and I won't be able to tell you my name because I'm either a) asleep or b) my brain feels so light it's floated away.
Before you fall down a YouTube rabbit hole trying to identify your own triggers, it's important to note ASMR isn't for everyone; you either experience the sensations or you don't. (If you're reading this thinking, "WTF?", chances are you're not one of the lucky ones, so it's back to guided meditation you go.) It's also not sexually arousing, despite often being referred to as a "braingasm". Yes, the average video contains much whispering and fondling of objects, but the fuzzy feelings it triggers are more like the ones you get from sedatives than sex. The fact no two ASMR experiences are the same goes a long way in explaining why it's relatively unexplored in the research realm, despite being six years old.
Like dinosaur erotica and "bronies" (male fans of My Little Pony), the ASMR subculture was born and bred via the internet. In 2008, a Yahoo! forum called the Society of Sensationalists popped up – a virtual water cooler around which "tingleheads" experiencing "weird head feelings" gathered to work throughquestions like, "What is this?" and "Is it normal?". Theories were swapped and triggers shared, but ASMR remained so on the fringe that Wikipedia editors continued to delete a page about it. It wasn't until American healthcare worker Jennifer Allen coined the term autonomous sensory meridian response in 2010 that it took off. Since then, there's been an influx of videos uploaded to YouTube, while the number of Google searches for ASMR in Australia has tripled in the past three years.
The sheer quantity of ASMR content being filmed and watched has made it impossible for scientists and academics to ignore the subject any longer. Researchers at Dartmouth College in the US have undertaken the first-ever study on ASMR, based on an analysis of MRI scans measuring viewers' brains, which is due to be published later this year.
Everyone from ASMRtists to independent researchers have theories about what's behind the sensation. Some have a distinct New-Age focus, attributing tingles to the "next stage of human consciousness", triggered by secretions from the brain's pineal gland. This gland, regarded by spiritualists and psychics as the body's "third eye", is the basis for the belief that regular meditation, yoga and various other esoteric methods, such as ASMR, can unlock a sense of "all-knowing" (aka extra sensory perception). Other theories suggest ASMR is an evolutionary process derived from the release of a pleasure chemical that keeps primates still when grooming each other. It's all very David Attenborough.
The American producer of the upcoming documentary Tingly Sensation: The ASMR Story, Kate Mull, believes ASMR taps into the comfort of happy memories, often from childhood. "The sensation and the broad range of people who experience it is interesting in itself, but when I started my interviews I quickly sensed the story could dig way deeper than that," she says. "Interviewees' stories about their ASMR experiences quickly became meaningful accounts of childhood memories and the rehashing of moments of comfort." It makes sense: numerous devotees pinpoint six or seven as the age they unknowingly experienced ASMR for the first time, when a softly spoken schoolteacher read a book to the class or a friend "drew" on their back.
A significant amount of ASMR content taps into nostalgia, with ASMRtists adopting the persona of a nurturing figure to give the viewer their undivided attention. The celebrity-like popularity of Russian medical assistant Maria, better known by her YouTube name GentleWhispering, has a lot to do with techniques that make it easy to forget she's "massaging" the temples of 256,000 other people, as well as your own. Her heavily accented whispers are amplified by 3D or binaural microphones, which create a feeling of intimacy. Three of her four most-viewed videos are role-plays, one of which (at 2.4 million views) simulates a haircut. "Woahhhh chills. This is better than sleeping pills," writes one fan.
Maria considers herself an amateur researcher. "That's basically what we ASMRtists do: use viewer comments as a way of gaining insight into the exact areas they get tingles and what they think triggered them, so that the next video we make speaks to those," she explains. Her inbox is flooded with requests every day but, given each video requires up to 40 hours' preparation time to source props, write scripts and research her pseudo-professions, it's impossible to meet them all. Still, she receives plenty of messages of thanks and saves them in a folder on her computer called Gratitude. "I get mail from army veterans who used to have terrible nightmares, people with anxiety who were on 20 medications a day, the mothers of kids who had trouble sleeping, expats feeling lonely in a new city, stressed-out businesswomen who just wanted something to zone out to… all types [of people]," she says.
Like most things, dependency can result in immunity, where you're no longer hypersensitive to the nuances of your favourite ASMRtists, but at least the soporific effects of the videos make it hard for those with full-time jobs to spend long periods of time watching a stranger play with jelly beans.
Sydney-based psychologist Azza Brown has no qualms about recommending ASMR to stress heads or insomniacs as an alternative to medication, and is even optimistic about it being incorporated into formal psychology practice. "Our lives are so busy that we're not often exposed to strong sensory experiences, like walking on the beach with the sand between our toes or feeling the calming touch of someone's hands," she says. "This is about getting in touch with the physiological aspects of relaxation rather than the cognitive, which requires a lot of effort and training. And it's not harmful at all, from what I can tell, so why not?"
In a world of overstimulated social-media addicts, there's no denying ASMR is the bedrock for a (mostly troll-free) online community dedicated to finding a moment of delicious stillness. As Maria puts it, "When you first find a community that gives what you feel a name, you breathe a sigh of relief. It's like, 'I've found my people'."
ASMRTISTS TO WATCH
GentleWhispering youtube.com/user/gentlewhispering250,000+ subscribers
ASMRrequests youtube.com/user/ASMRrequests 150,000+ subscribers
Heather Feather youtube.com/user/heatherfeatherasmr150,000+ subscribers
TheWaterwhispers youtube.com/user/thewaterwhispers150,000+ subscribers
MassageASMR youtube.com/user/MassageASMR 110,000+ subscribers
TheOneLilium youtube.com/user/TheOneLilium 80,000+ subscribers
Pigsbum53 youtube.com/user/pigsbum53 70,000+ subscribers
Lauren Ostrowski Fentonyoutube.com/user/laurenlouisefenton 14,000+ subscribers
Right this minute, thousands of people are watching a YouTube video of a woman stroking a boar-bristle hairbrush. Or she's flipping through an electronics catalogue. Or simulating an eye exam. It feels good, but not in a laptop-above, hands-below-the-doona way–this online community is tapping into the relaxationbenefits of a buzzy phenomenon called ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response), which is gaining a cult-following thanks to its potential to relieve anxiety and sleep disorders. Characterised by waves of pleasant tingles that typically start in the head and work through the body (like goosebumps in HD), it's a sensation triggered by aural and/or visual stimuli.
With more than 2.8 million videos on YouTube posted by self-proclaimed "ASMRtists" (the suppliers of said tingles), there's no shortage of choices, but what flicks your sensory switch can differ dramatically from person to person. The most common triggers include whispered show-and-tells of objects (from makeup to comic books), methodical folding of everyday items (paper and towels) and even attentive role-play (think suit fittings and haircuts). Personally, nothing transports me to a zen-like state faster than the touching of textured surfaces. I'm not fussy; crinkle a bit of plastic or lightly trace the surface of a book with a nail and I won't be able to tell you my name because I'm either a) asleep or b) my brain feels so light it's floated away.
Before you fall down a YouTube rabbit hole trying to identify your own triggers, it's important to note ASMR isn't for everyone; you either experience the sensations or you don't. (If you're reading this thinking, "WTF?", chances are you're not one of the lucky ones, so it's back to guided meditation you go.) It's also not sexually arousing, despite often being referred to as a "braingasm". Yes, the average video contains much whispering and fondling of objects, but the fuzzy feelings it triggers are more like the ones you get from sedatives than sex. The fact no two ASMR experiences are the same goes a long way in explaining why it's relatively unexplored in the research realm, despite being six years old.
Like dinosaur erotica and "bronies" (male fans of My Little Pony), the ASMR subculture was born and bred via the internet. In 2008, a Yahoo! forum called the Society of Sensationalists popped up – a virtual water cooler around which "tingleheads" experiencing "weird head feelings" gathered to work throughquestions like, "What is this?" and "Is it normal?". Theories were swapped and triggers shared, but ASMR remained so on the fringe that Wikipedia editors continued to delete a page about it. It wasn't until American healthcare worker Jennifer Allen coined the term autonomous sensory meridian response in 2010 that it took off. Since then, there's been an influx of videos uploaded to YouTube, while the number of Google searches for ASMR in Australia has tripled in the past three years.
The sheer quantity of ASMR content being filmed and watched has made it impossible for scientists and academics to ignore the subject any longer. Researchers at Dartmouth College in the US have undertaken the first-ever study on ASMR, based on an analysis of MRI scans measuring viewers' brains, which is due to be published later this year.
Everyone from ASMRtists to independent researchers have theories about what's behind the sensation. Some have a distinct New-Age focus, attributing tingles to the "next stage of human consciousness", triggered by secretions from the brain's pineal gland. This gland, regarded by spiritualists and psychics as the body's "third eye", is the basis for the belief that regular meditation, yoga and various other esoteric methods, such as ASMR, can unlock a sense of "all-knowing" (aka extra sensory perception). Other theories suggest ASMR is an evolutionary process derived from the release of a pleasure chemical that keeps primates still when grooming each other. It's all very David Attenborough.
The American producer of the upcoming documentary Tingly Sensation: The ASMR Story, Kate Mull, believes ASMR taps into the comfort of happy memories, often from childhood. "The sensation and the broad range of people who experience it is interesting in itself, but when I started my interviews I quickly sensed the story could dig way deeper than that," she says. "Interviewees' stories about their ASMR experiences quickly became meaningful accounts of childhood memories and the rehashing of moments of comfort." It makes sense: numerous devotees pinpoint six or seven as the age they unknowingly experienced ASMR for the first time, when a softly spoken schoolteacher read a book to the class or a friend "drew" on their back.
A significant amount of ASMR content taps into nostalgia, with ASMRtists adopting the persona of a nurturing figure to give the viewer their undivided attention. The celebrity-like popularity of Russian medical assistant Maria, better known by her YouTube name GentleWhispering, has a lot to do with techniques that make it easy to forget she's "massaging" the temples of 256,000 other people, as well as your own. Her heavily accented whispers are amplified by 3D or binaural microphones, which create a feeling of intimacy. Three of her four most-viewed videos are role-plays, one of which (at 2.4 million views) simulates a haircut. "Woahhhh chills. This is better than sleeping pills," writes one fan.
Maria considers herself an amateur researcher. "That's basically what we ASMRtists do: use viewer comments as a way of gaining insight into the exact areas they get tingles and what they think triggered them, so that the next video we make speaks to those," she explains. Her inbox is flooded with requests every day but, given each video requires up to 40 hours' preparation time to source props, write scripts and research her pseudo-professions, it's impossible to meet them all. Still, she receives plenty of messages of thanks and saves them in a folder on her computer called Gratitude. "I get mail from army veterans who used to have terrible nightmares, people with anxiety who were on 20 medications a day, the mothers of kids who had trouble sleeping, expats feeling lonely in a new city, stressed-out businesswomen who just wanted something to zone out to… all types [of people]," she says.
Like most things, dependency can result in immunity, where you're no longer hypersensitive to the nuances of your favourite ASMRtists, but at least the soporific effects of the videos make it hard for those with full-time jobs to spend long periods of time watching a stranger play with jelly beans.
Sydney-based psychologist Azza Brown has no qualms about recommending ASMR to stress heads or insomniacs as an alternative to medication, and is even optimistic about it being incorporated into formal psychology practice. "Our lives are so busy that we're not often exposed to strong sensory experiences, like walking on the beach with the sand between our toes or feeling the calming touch of someone's hands," she says. "This is about getting in touch with the physiological aspects of relaxation rather than the cognitive, which requires a lot of effort and training. And it's not harmful at all, from what I can tell, so why not?"
In a world of overstimulated social-media addicts, there's no denying ASMR is the bedrock for a (mostly troll-free) online community dedicated to finding a moment of delicious stillness. As Maria puts it, "When you first find a community that gives what you feel a name, you breathe a sigh of relief. It's like, 'I've found my people'."
ASMRTISTS TO WATCH
GentleWhispering youtube.com/user/gentlewhispering250,000+ subscribers
ASMRrequests youtube.com/user/ASMRrequests 150,000+ subscribers
Heather Feather youtube.com/user/heatherfeatherasmr150,000+ subscribers
TheWaterwhispers youtube.com/user/thewaterwhispers150,000+ subscribers
MassageASMR youtube.com/user/MassageASMR 110,000+ subscribers
TheOneLilium youtube.com/user/TheOneLilium 80,000+ subscribers
Pigsbum53 youtube.com/user/pigsbum53 70,000+ subscribers
Lauren Ostrowski Fentonyoutube.com/user/laurenlouisefenton 14,000+ subscribers
