Audio Patterns?

[Sportster]

. . .

 

[StephF]

Yep, I've always been able to do this with audio signals.

 

[Judge]

Always with me. I used to love to play with a graphic equalizer just to listen to how I could add or subtract sounds on the Hertz range in varying plus or minus octaves.

Especially now with Tinnitus where I'm always aware of high frequency sounds and their specific undulation at any given time but only in my right ear.

At bedtime I listen to digitally looped rainfall sounds from my Homedics clock radio. I used to use a fan....but air blowing about all night isn't practical in winter, or when you have dust allergies in the desert.

 

[Rayner]

Yes I do pick up on patterns quite well. All sorts of patterns even patterns of what people do socially. I really enjoy looking at the different grain patterns in wood.

 

[Astroganga]

Yes I have always been able to do this as well. Both visually and with audio. I have a white noise app on my phone but I cannot use it because I pick up on the loop pattern of the audio right away and it is kind of irritating. Especially with the sounds that are meant to be natural like birdsong.

 

[Diagnosed2015]

As you described the experience, I could see it happening on a train, where the noise of the wheels on the track is rhythmic. If you've never heard Arlo Guthrie's song, The City of New Orleans," you might like it.

I have a problem with noise and sound, mostly it's been evident with the TV commercials which are using songs we grew up with to entice those in my age group. Many of the songs would be heard once or twice at a club or on the radio, but when you have to hear "Final Countdown" 25 times a day, it starts to get too much.

There is one commercial where I'm pretty sure they are singing, but I can't detect a melody or rhythm that's recognizable in the least, and I can't tell if they are just reading words, or singing a crazy "messed up" song.

But, then you watch a stupid movie (to me) like "Close Encounters..." and the noise from the spaceship makes sense, even if nothing else does.

I have a problem with hearing "vibrations." I hear a drone when people are speaking, but not to me (like in the distance), I hear the lights vibrating, I can hear an alarm vibrating in a different apartment. I have to tune out a lot of commercials, because I can't stand hearing them over and over, even if I like the song.

This most recent change in my "symptoms" (along with a good team) is what alerted them to my AS diagnosis, among others. I remembered that my son used to come upstairs from the basement, and ask me to turn off the computer. I know recognize why. He could hear a drone that no one else could.

 

[QuestionKid]

Yes I have always been able to do this as well. Both visually and with audio. I have a white noise app on my phone but I cannot use it because I pick up on the loop pattern of the audio right away and it is kind of irritating. Especially with the sounds that are meant to be natural like birdsong.

This post resonates with me. I thought I would enjoy the white noise app but it easily loses it appeal when you recognize the loop. I think a much longer recording would help but it still would not eliminate the eventual recognition of the pattern because a loop is a loop.

Patterns are patterns whether audio or visual so I think many of us are just predisposed to pick up that detail.

 

[Diagnosed2015]

Oh yeah, that's a great song!!! Oddly enough, I enjoy the sound of train wheels on the track.

I am very conscious of trains going by in the distance (they were in our backyard where I last stayed) and firetrucks. I always thought it was just this weird fascination with me, but I always want to follow them. I also "need to know" what's going on, so I have a police scanner available, too. Sometimes, I have everything going at once, but a single spoken sentence or tune on TV will drive me crazy.

 

[Loke]

Yes! This is something I've always done, since I was a kid and up until now. I find patterns in everything, but sound especially. I had no idea it was an aspie thing though, the more you know haha.

 

[invisible]

This always happens to me. It makes the audio in a lot of games sound quite unrealistic (at least, 5 or 10 years ago when I used to play games) and I developed a system which partially avoided the problem by overlaying multiple different recordings of the same sound (e.g. the sound of an aircraft engine) at random timings and fading between them. Some things in real life do this as well though, like fans, vacuum cleaners, washing machines, microwaves, ovens, and a lot of things which have a rotating part. It can be quite irritating.