What Is a Brain Orgasm?

Soothing auditory and/or visual experiences1, videos of gentle whispering, close attention to stimuli, or seemingly mundane things, tasks, or activities such as brushing hair, getting an eye exam, eating, or filing papers can induce the phenomenon. Triggering sounds include chewing, tapping, scratching, crinkling, and electronic noises.

Since the phenomenon was first named in 2010, the concept of a brain orgasm has become a popular topic on social media, with people reporting their experiences (or lack thereof).

History

Jennifer Allen coined the term in 2010 after spending years trying to learn more about this strange experience2; however, she had difficulty finding information.

This changed when she came across a 2007 post on a message board known as SteadyHealth about a “weird sensation that feels good,” a description that sounded very similar to what she’d been feeling. Bolstered by a growing community of blogs, websites, and the sharing of experiences, this initial group drew others who were familiar with this phenomenon.

Allen then created a Facebook group called “ASMR Group” that attracted participants worldwide. Once Allen gave a name to this pleasurable phenomenon, interest surged. Soon, content creators began making videos describing the experience and leading people through it.

Overview

In recent years, the terms brain orgasm and ASMR have become a part of the American lexicon. Stories about the quest for this experience have gone viral, and searches for the terms number in the millions per month.

ASMRtists

A quick online search of “ASMR” or “head tingles” leads to a multitude of videos explaining what it is and how to experience it. ASMR-triggering videos abound, tailored to just about every conceivable trigger. For the most popular ASMRtists, posting content has become a lucrative full-time job.

Unknowns

Anecdotal evidence is plentiful, but exactly how or why ASMR happens remains unknown. Various theories attribute it to minor, non-harmful seizures; a previously unknown facet of the brain’s pleasure response; simply the sensation of calming in the nerves of the head; a normal variation of the human brain; and much more.3 Likewise, no one yet knows if all people are capable of experiencing it and why some do not.

Says one 2019 study, “Individuals with ASMR showed increases in neural activity in regions of the cortex related to attention, audition, emotion, and movement” when watching ASMR content. Those in the control groups did not, indicating that ASMR is a complex experience involving both sensory and emotional features.5

Promoting Calm and Sleep

Some ASMR content makers liken the experience to a biofeedback reward that promotes relaxation and stress reduction. Many of the most common triggers, including quiet melodies and sounds, soft breathing, and caring attention, echo sensations that soothe babies and young children. Similarly, repetitive background noises such as light tapping, the crunch of an apple, or the sounds of a hairbrush running through hair or a makeup brush over skin are used in sleep-promoting noise machines. Not surprisingly, many people use ASMR videos that promote sleep.

Is ASMR Sexual?

Although “brain orgasm” implies a sexual response, the experience is not sexual. ASMR does resemble the tingly, warm pulses described in a traditional, sexual orgasm, the brain orgasm is centered in deep, possibly euphoric relaxation.

People who have these experiences describe a pleasant, trance-like state or a feeling of supreme relaxation of the head and neck that sometimes extends to the spine, limbs, or other body parts. Usually, where it’s felt depends on the intensity of the response. Most people do not liken it to a sexual response.

Some in the ASMR community specifically reject the sexual connotations of “brain orgasm” and are uncomfortable with the implication that it’s somehow illicit. Others embrace the term and believe it accurately articulates the sensation.

Personal Attention

However, intimacy and personal attention can play a large role in triggering this sensation. Methods of bringing on this response include close whispering, hand motions, sounds like chewing and scratching, and guided scenarios or role-playing of intimate (but chaste) social situations like a massage or a dental cleaning.

ASMR content often features caring, gentle encounters (in person or simulated in videos) with others. This may explain how ASMR builds feelings of connection, being cared for, and emotional intimacy that in turn trigger the calming, tingling effect.3

Non-Sexual Calming and Arousal

Interestingly, participants, both anecdotally and in many studies, often report the seemingly opposite responses of relaxation and excitement to their triggering videos.

Researchers surmise that the self-reported simultaneous activating and deactivating positive emotions caused by these videos point to the complexity of ASMR and compare it to nostalgia, which is often a bittersweet happiness.3

Additionally, some evidence points to the idea that complex emotional experiences can be even better for health than purely positive ones. One 2013 study found that those who experienced this type of mixed or complex emotion more often had relatively better physical health outcomes than those who did not.7

How Do You Know?

People who have experienced ASMR say that if you’re experiencing it, you’ll just know—like spotting a hidden item in a stereogram or having a sexual orgasm. Interestingly, some people find it annoying or merely distracting, whereas others find it calming and tingle-inducing.

Likewise, some people experience it as a trance-like relaxed state or even fall asleep, which can also legitimately be called ASMR, although some might limit a brain orgasm or head tingles to actually feeling those electric, prickly sensations.

How to Have a Brain Orgasm

Some people don’t need to try to have ASMR. Others require more effort or simply can’t seem to experience it.

Many people who have ASMR report first experiencing it in childhood.3 However, others discover brain orgasms or head tingles in adulthood.

The strength of the sensation varies among people and areas stimulated. More intense reactions tend to travel farther in the body, along the spine, and to the legs and/or arms.6

Although it’s hard to know how (or if) you will respond, a few common, straightforward techniques help some people achieve an autonomous sensory meridian response.

Triggers vary with personal preferences, but a few are particularly and commonly effective. These include soothing, repetitive sounds such as tapping, rustling, crunching, or touching; soft, whispered voices; and scenarios that involve personal care, such as getting a facial or light massage.

Essentially, anything that evokes feelings of well-being, relaxation, being cared for, or speaks to you in some way may work to elicit this response.

Likely, if you were a person who might experience this feeling in real life, as in during an actual haircut, you would know this by now. So, the best way to discover ASMR is simply to look up videos that may appeal to you and try them out (more helpful tips below).

Potential Benefits

Overwhelming anecdotal evidence of significant mental and physical health benefits of ASMR is backed by emerging research. People who practice ASMR tout it as calming, relaxing, meditative, and enjoyable.

Anecdotal reports of ASMR experiences also appear to share some features with “flow,” a state of intense focus and diminished awareness of time often associated with optimal performance in activities such as sports.

Studies consistently find that many participants use ASMR to achieve the following benefits:6

• Anxiety reduction
• Emotional regulation
• Entertainment
• Feelings of interpersonal connection
• Improved mood
• Increased positivity
• Mindfulness
• Pain reduction
• Relaxation
• Sleep, both to help them fall asleep and improve the quality of sleep
• Stress relief

Lowered Heart Rate

Research shows that brain orgasms result in measurable physiological effects, including lowered heart rate and increased skin conductivity— an example of the concurrent deactivating and activating responses mentioned above.3

Interestingly, the same research shows that the reductions in heart rate found during ASMR are comparable to those achieved in music-based stress reduction therapies and even more effective than some mindfulness-based stress relief programs.

Improved Mood

Studies show that engaging in ASMR content improves the mood and lowers stress in the vast majority of viewers, including those with depression and anxiety. In fact, in one study, participants who had depression experienced a greater improvement in mood than those without depression.6

Better Sleep

ASMR is also effective for combating insomnia. Many people report using ASMR right before bed to induce sleep, and some content is made explicitly for this purpose.8

Increased Connectedness

ASMR may also fight loneliness. There is significant research showing that social isolation and loneliness contribute to health decline. ASMR may offer a way for people to increase feelings of connectedness, which in turn may positively influence their physical health. In fact, a 2015 meta review study found that both perceived and actual social isolation produce a substantial risk factor for early mortality.9

Stress Relief

Some people respond more to the sounds, while others seek more visual stimulation. Interestingly, one study found a positive correlation between those who experience ASMR and those who have an increased “openness-to-experience” as well as neuroticism, as in someone who is more anxious or sensitive.1 This indicates that scenarios inducing stress relief may be especially relevant to ASMR-reactivity.

Brain Orgasm vs. Music Chills

Similar but distinct sensations are the chills some people experience when listening to music as well as the awe when viewing something beautiful.

Although both music and aesthetic chills produce physiological changes that can be described as tingly, they result in an increase in heart rate rather than the decrease common in ASMR.3

Tips and Tricks

For many ardent ASMR-devotees, simply watching their preferred content induces a brain orgasm, while others may need to work a bit harder for the sensation to occur. Try the following strategies to up your chances of experiencing this tingly feeling.10

Setting

Many users of ASMR report that watching videos in a quiet, calm, comfortable environment is most effective for inducing the desired brain tingle response.

Pick a place that is distraction-free and feels safe and comfortable. Low light and limited background noise are optimal as well.

Focus

Aim to give the video total focus. If you are doing something else at the same time, say scrolling through a news feed or your emails on your phone, you’re less likely to experience the desired ASMR.

Sound

While many of the videos include whispering and other soft noises, you want to be sure you can hear it well. Using headphones to deepen the sound stimuli and also block out any background noise is also recommended by many participants in ASMR.

Novelty and Tolerance

Just like many things in life, repetition can bring boredom or lack of reactivity. This is true with ASMR as well. Many people report that they may become less receptive to videos the more they watch them.

So, it’s helpful to vary your triggers and content providers in order to continue to experience the desired response.

Questions of Representation

Some people are uncomfortable with and question why so many of the content creators are young, attractive, and female (and also often white), drawing criticisms of institutional sexism and racism.

This observation also invites comparisons to the exploitation of young women in many other realms of life as well as the exclusion of historically marginalized communities.

Also, while most ASMR enthusiasts do not seek out the content for sexual purposes, some do—and some of the content can be construed as overtly sexualized as in videos that rely on using “mouth-play” (mouth noises like kissing or tongue-clicking) and showing lots of cleavage or other typically erotic body parts or poses.

However, another pertinent comparison is that women are also often caregivers, and as ASMR content usually exudes gentleness, compassion, relaxation, and intimacy, it may make sense that many women are drawn to working in this field—and that many viewers instinctively choose female ASMR content creators.

Popular ASMRtists

The majority of the most successful and well-known ASMR content creators are young women, as noted above, who whisper, perform role play scenarios like folding towels or crumpling paper, and orchestrate other sounds close to the camera.

Some of these makers talk directly to their viewers and walk them through the experience, while others simply create the stimuli.

Some of the most popular, who have many multi-millions of devotees between them, include the following:

• ASMR Darling
• ASMR Glow
• ASMR Zeitgeist
• Ephemeral Rift
• Gentle Whispering ASMR
• Gibi ASMR
• Jojo’s ASMR
• Latte ASMR
• Tingting ASMR

However, searching a bit more online will easily find you a wide range of people producing these videos from every walk of life and background. You’ll find makeup artists, sound therapists, former insomniacs, and everything in between.

What most of them share, however, is a kind, soothing voice and a passion for creating community and connection to help their viewers relax, sleep, and feel good.

A Word From Verywell

Gentleness, well-being, euphoria, tingly warmth, stress relief, calm, and sweet slumber are some of the attributes of a brain orgasm or ASMR. What’s not to like? For those who experience it, the answer is usually nothing. Instead, they sing the praises of this deeply relaxing, restorative sensation.

Even better, this phenomenon is easily accessible to many simply by watching free ASMR content online. So, if you’re intrigued and want to feel some tingles for yourself (or find help falling asleep), sign on and give it a try.