Can You Hear Colors?

Interestingly enough, some individuals can visualize color when they hear music. People with this ability have a form of “synesthesia” and are known as “synesthetes.” The word “synesthesia,” which is derived from Latin, literally means “concomitant sensations,” defined as a unique blending of two senses or perceptions. While this mixing of sensations may involve any combination of hearing, sight, taste, touch, and smell, the most common types are “color-graphemic,” in which letters, numbers, or geometric shapes are linked to colors or patterns, and “color-auditory” synesthesia, in which various sounds immediately summon up specific colors, shapes, or textures. Researchers estimate that about one in every 100,000 to one in every 5,000 people has one or more forms of synesthesia.

Your ability to hear is as unique as your fingerprints. Age, noisy environments, heredity, medical conditions, and childhood and adult illnesses can combine to produce different types of hearing losses in different people. When you need help with your hearing, we hope you’ll turn to the services of a clinical audiologist at The Ear Clinic. We’ll find the hearing instrument best suited to your hearing abilities. Call us at 226-909-0966 to arrange a complimentary hearing evaluation. We are located at 46 Nelson Street W., across from the LCBO.

P.S. Synesthesia, which affected such cultural luminaries as writer Vladimir Nabokov, painter Wassily Kandinsky, inventor Nikola Tesla, and composer Franz Liszt, can be a source of creative inspiration.