Have you ever thought of “coloring” the names of the days of the week? When you listen to someone speaking, do you see a rainbow of colors? Or perhaps Mozart’s music tastes like an apple pie to you? If so, it is very likely that you have synesthesia.
Synesthesia is a condition in which people’s senses intermix. In some cases, people with synesthesia may experience colors when they hear, read, or even think of letters and numbers. In others, words can trigger a real sensation of taste on their tongue.
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In the early 1990s, however, scientists noticed that synesthetic colors do not change over time. When asked what color is evoked by a letter or number, synesthetic people would persistently give the same answer even if tested months or years apart.
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The most compelling support, however, comes from brain scans, which show that color processing areas in the brain light up when these people listen to certain words.
Is synesthesia genetically inherited or acquired after birth? Scientists agree that synesthesia has a genetic basis, because it frequently runs in families. But an actual synesthesia gene (or genes) has not been identified yet.
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For example, the flavors people with taste-word synesthesia experience are usually childhood flavors, such as chocolate or strawberries. Also, people with color-music synesthesia more often than not have had early musical training.
Once thought to be extremely rare, synesthesia is now found to affect about one to four percent of the population.
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As is often observed, most of us tend to associate lower notes with darker colors and higher notes with brighter colors. Researchers further point out that in most people synesthesia is active only during the first months of their infancy, while this ability remains forever in certain individuals.