What is misokinesia, a psychological syndrome that affects more and more people

There is a new psychological syndrome on researchers’ radar that has come to light thanks to a study, the first of its kind, that investigated stressful feelings that are triggered by seeing others get agitated or feeling nervous.

His name is misokinesia and consists of the extreme discomfort caused by the presence of a restless person. A phenomenon more common than you think and which, according to the experts behind the study, could affect one in three people in the world.

Misokinesis means “I hate movements”, and it is a phenomenon little studied by scientists but which was identified during research on a closely related disease, mosophonia: a disorder in which people are irritated when they hear certain repetitive sounds.

Misokinesis is somewhat similar, but the triggers are usually more visual than aural, the researchers say.

“[Misokinesia] it is defined as a strong affective or negative emotional response to the sight of another person’s small, repetitive movements, such as seeing someone move without stopping with a hand or a foot ”, said in a study led by Sumeet Jaswal of the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Canada, PhD in Psychology

To improve our understanding of this poorly studied subject, Jawal and his fellow researchers conducted what they say is the “First in-depth scientific exploration” misokinesis, and the results indicate that an increased sensitivity to restlessness is something that a large number of people face.

Through a series of experiments with more than 4,100 participants, the researchers measured the prevalence of misokinesia in a cohort of students and people in the general population, assessing the impacts it had on them and exploring why the sensations were could manifest.

“We found that about a third of patients reported some degree of sensitivity to misokinesia to the repetitive and agitated behaviors of others they encounter in their daily lives.” explain the researchers.

“These results support the conclusion that susceptibility to misokinesis is not a phenomenon limited to clinical populations, but rather, is a fundamental and heretofore under-recognized social challenge, shared by many in the general population.”they add.

According to the analysis, misokinesia sometimes goes hand in hand with the sonic sensitivity of misophonia, but not always. The phenomenon appears to vary widely from person to person, with some people reporting low sensitivity to agitated stimuli, while others are severely affected.

“They are negatively affected emotionally and experience reactions such as anger, anxiety or frustration, as well as decreased pleasure in social situations, work environments and learning.”explains UBC psychologist Todd Handy.

“Some even do less social activities because of the disease”, Underline

Handy began researching misokinesis after a couple told him he was picky and confessed that he felt stress when agitated (or someone else, for that matter. ).

“As a visual cognitive neuroscientist, it really piqued my interest in finding out what is going on in the brain.”, Handy dice.

So the million dollar question always arises: Why is it so annoying for us to be restless?

In the study, researchers performed tests to see if people’s misokinesia could stem from increased visual-attentional sensitivity, which is tantamount to an inability to block distracting events occurring in their visual periphery.

Results based on early experiments were inconclusive on this front, and researchers found no strong evidence that reflexive visual attention mechanisms substantially contribute to sensitivity to miskinesia.

While we’re really only at the beginning of exploring where cognitively miskinesia can come from, other than, you know, agitated people are a little boring, researchers have a few hypothetical clues they want to pursue. in their future research.

“One possibility we want to explore is that their ‘mirror neurons’ are at play”, Jaswal said. “These neurons activate when we move, but they also activate when we see others move. For example, when you see someone hurt themselves, you may also wince in pain, as their pain is reflected in your own brain.”.

By extension, people prone to misokinesia may subconsciously sympathize with the psychology of the agitated. And not in a good way.

“One of the reasons people are agitated is that they are anxious or nervous, so when people with misokinesia see someone who is agitated, they may reflect that and feel anxious or nervous as well.Jaswal explains.

As to whether this is really what is happening here with misokinesis, only further investigation into the phenomenon will be able to tell for sure.

However, one thing is certain. From the results seen here, it is clear that this unusual phenomenon is much more common than you might think.

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