Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response

Two longtime friends launch the ‘ASMR Newscast’

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityLee Terrill received her BA degree in Early Childhood Education, has taught 2nd grade and been a professional cake decorator, and now enjoys working an office job with a small, local business.

Logan Jenkins has his BA degree in Fine Arts with an emphasis in Graphic Design, has worked as a Graphic Designer and Flash Developer, and currently works as a Frontend Web Developer.

Both live in South Carolina, USA, are avid board game players, and decided to team up to co-host the podcast titled, ASMR Newscast.

The ASMR Newscast launched on September 7, 2015 and they have been releasing weekly episodes with content quite fitting to their podcast’s description;

“we will bring you news from around the ASMR community along with a few relaxing sounds to give you the best tingles.”

In my interview with Lee and Logan they share how they met, how ASMR is helpful to each of them, their motivation to create a podcast, details about their podcast, challenges they have encountered so far, and more.

Below are my questions in bold, their replies in italics, and links to their podcast and other resources.

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Could watching lots of ASMR videos be a symptom of sleep apnea?

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityTwo reasons some people watch lots of ASMR videos is to help them with sleep problems and/or depression.

And although this may be helpful to some who have these problems, the cause of their sleep problems and depression may still need to be diagnosed so the underlying disorder can be best treated.

Recent research in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine demonstrated that sleep problems and depression are both common symptoms in people with sleep apnea.

So what is sleep apnea?

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History of ASMR: Birth of the ASMR Community (podcast episode #2)

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityOctober 29, 2007 could be viewed as the birth date of the ASMR community.

On this day, an individual by the username of “okaywhatever” started a forum thread at the website http://www.steadyhealth.com.

The title of the thread was, “Weird sensation feels good” and attracted over 300 replies.  The content of these initial replies quickly created a clear and consistent description of ASMR which still accurately describes ASMR today.

Some of the participants in the thread, such as Jennifer Allen and Andrew MacMuiris, spawned out and developed resources which were monumental to the growth and understanding of ASMR.

Overall, this forum thread lead directly to the following ASMR milestones:

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Meet Dana ASMR, a Korean ASMR artist with almost 100,000 followers

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityDaham “Dana” Park is an undergraduate university student majoring in Journalism and Advertising in Seoul, South Korea.

Dana also creates Korean-language and English-language ASMR videos on YouTube as “Dana ASMR”.

She started her video channel in 2013, at the start of the rise of ASMR in South Korea.  She has currently been seeing a strong surge of interest in ASMR in South Korea as her YouTube channel is nearing 100,000 followers.

In my interview with Dana she shares how ASMR videos made in South Korea differ from ASMR videos from other countries, if the understanding of ASMR is different in South Korea compared to other countries, how her blog is helping others in her country to understand ASMR better, and more.

Below are my questions in bold, her replies in italics, and links to her YouTube channel, Facebook page, blog, and Instagram account.

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The potential biology of ASMR stimulated by light touch

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityPopular triggers for ASMR include someone playing with your hair, cutting your hair, stroking your arm, drawing words on your back with their finger (back writing game), and/or examining you for health concerns (clinical exams).

What do all these strong triggers for ASMR have in common?

Light touch.

Being touched lightly has been perceived as pleasurable for a while.  In contrast, the biological understanding of these pleasant sensations has only recently begun to be understood – and may help to understand ASMR.

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Update: Support “Murmurs”, a cinematic ASMR movie currently in production

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityUpdate to the August 5, 2015 post (prior post included at end of this update).

Congratulations to Graeme Cole, the filmmaker producing the cinematic movie, “Murmurs”, about an ASMR artist.  His fundraising campaign achieved its goal.  The raised funds will assist him in the final steps to complete and market the movie.

The campaign site remains open to allow visitors to see his fundraising journey so far, to view video clips from the movie, and to provide post-goal contributions which will further assist him to bring his movie to life.

Graeme also has a Facebook page to keep everyone updated about the progress of the movie.

Below is my congratulations to Graeme in bold, his reply in italics, a link to his campaign site, a link to his Facebook page, and the prior post which includes a full interview with Graeme and information about the movie.

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How do the speech patterns of ASMR artists compare to Bob Ross, Bill O’Reilly, and Geraldo Rivera?

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityGordon McGladdery is a professional composer and sound designer living in Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada.

He has his Bachelor of Arts in English literature from University of Victoria in Canada and an additional diploma in Sound Design for Visual Media from the Vancouver Film School.

Gordon first learned about ASMR in 2012 and immediately created his own research project.

He analyzed the speech patterns of several ASMR artists (GentleWhispering, VeniVidiVulpes, AppreciateASMR, and others) and compared them to the speech patterns of others (Bob Ross, Bill O’Reilly, Geraldo Rivera, and others).

He initially shared his findings with the ASMR community in an ASMR subreddit thread.

In my interview with Gordon he shares how he first learned about ASMR, the objectives of his study, his ideas about further analysis that could be done on ASMR-related audio, his favorite ASMR artist, and more.

Below are my questions in bold and his replies in italics.

Immediately following the interview is Gordon’s detailed description of how he did his analysis and his data findings.

The post concludes with a podcast Gordon created about his study, as well as, links to his initial ASMR subreddit post, to his spreadsheet of the speech pattern data, to his website, to his musical compositions, and more.

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Meet WhisperSparkles, one of the first ASMR artists on YouTube

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ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityAmanda McDonnell is a mother of four children and has a diploma in Medical Sciences from the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland.

She is originally from Belfast, Northern Ireland and is currently living in Glasgow, Scotland.

Amanda is also known as the ASMR artist, WhisperSparkles.

The first whisper channel on YouTube appeared in 2009 (see the History of ASMR for more details).  Amanda created her channel soon after in 2010, making her one of the first dedicated whisperers on the internet.

In my interview with Amanda she shares why she created a whisper channel is 2010, how ASMR videos have changed over time, how her interest in ASMR helped her to meet her fiancé, and more.

Below are my questions in bold, her replies in italics, and a link to her YouTube channel so you can enjoy her early videos from 2010, as well as, her most recent videos.

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Update on Bryson Lochte and his MRI study on ASMR

/ Dr. Richard / 4 Comments

ASMR Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response UniversityIn 2012, Bryson Lochte selected ASMR as his research topic for his undergraduate Senior Honors Thesis at Dartmouth College.  He chose to investigate the effects of ASMR videos on the brain by using fMRI analysis.

fMRI stands for functional magnetic resonance imaging and reveals changes in the blood flow to specific areas of the brain.  His project’s goal was to demonstrate which areas of the brain show increased activity while participants watched ASMR videos.

In February of 2013 Bryson posted a thread on the ASMR subreddit website requesting volunteers for his research project.  He completed his thesis by May and submitted the results to the Dartmouth College Library Catalog.

In November, 2013 Bryson posted on the ASMR subreddit site that he would not be able to publicly release a copy of his thesis until his data was published.

Bryson graduated from Dartmouth College in 2013 with his undergraduate degree in Neuroscience.  He is currently a medical student at the University of California, San Diego.

In my interview with Bryson he shares an update on his undergraduate thesis data, his inspiration for delving into ASMR research, his current ASMR research project, his insights into the biology of ASMR, advice for those researching ASMR, and more.

Below are my questions in bold, his replies in italics, and links to his website, his LinkedIn page, and his original ASMR subreddit post.

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