SynesthesiaNotes


Synesthesia

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Booba and Kiki images are here: BoobaAndKiki

 

95-98% of respondents say that the spikey image is Kiki and the blob image is Booba. V.S. Ramachandran and others conclude from this that we are all synesthetes at some level. For the conditions more commonly considered synesthesia, estimates range as high as 1 in 23 people experiencing them. Ramachandran found that approximately one in two hundred people experience the most common form of synesthesia -- seeing numbers as colored.

 

Ramachandran demonstrated that synesthesia is not just an illusion with the test below. Picking out the pattern of twos from among the fives takes many seconds for a non-synesthete:

 

But synesthetes who see numbers as colors can identify the pattern instantly: