Soundbites Diagnosis, neural mechanisms and treatment of misophonia

Misophonia (meaning hatred of sound) is a novel condition in which patients experience irritation, anger and disgust, triggered by sounds produced by other human beings. These intense emotions lead to severe suffering and social disfunctioning.
The aim of this thesis was to lay a first foundation for understanding misophonia by addressing three core issues:
1. What is misophonia?
2. What happens in the brain of someone with misophonia during the misophonic reaction?
3. How can we treat misophonia?
Our findings suggest that misophonia can be considered a separate psychiatric disorder. This is further underlined by our two neurobiological studies, using EEG and fMRI paradigms. Automatic processing of ordinary sounds is aberrant in misophonia patients. Subsequently, when they are confronted with misophonic triggers in a fMRI scanner, patients indeed feel anger and disgust and experience physiological arousal which is also visible in brain activation patterns. Importantly, misophonia symptoms can be reduced by a combination of four cognitive behavioral therapy techniques.