According to scientific evidence, between 5 and 20 percent of people experience sound associations when looking at a moving image - even if it is not accompanied by any sound. This phenomenon has been called vEAR - visually evoked auditory response. The reason for this is the cooperation of individual areas of the brain.
Scientists from the University of London decided to test how the "visual ears" work. To do this, they studied 36 people, most of whom are professional musicians. The subjects were separately shown and given to listen to the Morse code sequences - in the form of dots on the screen and in the form of sound signals, respectively. Simultaneously with this alternating current, the subjects were stimulated by the temporal lobe of the brain (it is responsible for processing sounds) or the occipital (the visual cortex of the brain is located there).
It turned out that in people who do not experience vEAR, the visual and auditory regions of the brain essentially compete with each other. For example, when such subjects were stimulated with the alpha rhythm of the temporal lobe (which is responsible for the perception of sounds), this suppressed the activity of the auditory cortex and improved visual function. The opposite pattern was observed when the occipital lobe was stimulated in patients without vEAR.
An example of an animation that * makes a sound *. Do you hear?
But those who experienced a visually evoked auditory response did not show such a relationship. In such subjects, in fact, a kind of synesthesia - a phenomenon in which unrelated areas of the brain are simultaneously disinhibited, forcing them to "hear" neon signs and "see" the sounds of a symphony.