from Hacker News

White noise improves learning by modulating activity in midbrain regions (2014)

by Friday_ on 3/8/22, 3:01 PM with 103 comments

  • by fouc on 3/8/22, 8:40 PM

    From Norman Doidge's book "The Brain That Changes Itself", I learned that:

    Long term white noise exposure might be associated with hearing loss, especially age-related. The theory was that "nerves that fire together, wire together", too much white noise compared to clear sounds will cause the neural mapping for sounds to gradually become fuzzier, making distinctions between sounds will become harder.

  • by gfosco on 3/8/22, 5:11 PM

    I got into it because of tinnitus, and used it to sleep, but eventually started using it when working. Years ago in menlo park, with headphones on and white/brown noise drowning out the world. I likened it sensory deprivation, as nothing rises above the noise floor and it can fade away from your attention.

  • by antattack on 3/8/22, 4:40 PM

    "we tested the hypothesis that auditory white noise, when presented during the encoding of scene images, enhances subsequent recognition memory performance and modulates activity within the dopaminergic midbrain"

    Important highlight is that primary task (of remembering images) did not use (or need to use) auditory sense.

  • by fergonco on 3/8/22, 4:54 PM

    Andrew Huberman saying in a podcast that it's not the case for verbal recall:

    https://youtu.be/Ze2pc6NwsHQ?t=3350

    Interesting podcast, btw. got it from HN few days ago.

  • by executesorder66 on 3/8/22, 6:01 PM

    I've always been confused by people that enjoy white noise. It's awful.

    Here is a sample from the wikipedia page on white noise :

    https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File%3AWhite...

    Does anyone genuinely enjoy listening to that?

    On the other hand, even though I don't, I could imagine why someone might like Brown noise (sounds almost like the ocean) :

    https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File%3ABrown...

  • by wing-_-nuts on 3/8/22, 7:12 PM

    I use a non-looping white/brown noise machine to help me sleep at night and it works wonders in the city.

    One thing I've wondered is the health effects of listening to that noise at ~ 40db all night over all these years. OSHA says that anything under ~ 80db is safe for 8h, but I do wonder if there are any longer term impacts to hearing or audio processing for softer sounds played over a lifetime. I could easily see the brain adapting and 'ignoring' noise in that spectrum. For now, I simply consider the extra sleep I get to be worth the price.

  • by jhoechtl on 3/8/22, 7:53 PM

    Headline in 30 years: The long term effect of white noise caused a decline in IQ by 5%.

    We would do better not to manipulate our brain when we do not know the mechanics.

  • by tines on 3/8/22, 5:16 PM

    Possibly the same reason why people like to listen to music while working? The essential feature common to white noise and music you're familiar with could be the predictability. I know for me a good song (uptempo, not too distracting) can help me block out the outside world and make me feel very productive.

  • by westurner on 3/8/22, 6:25 PM

    White noise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_noise

    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28402424 :

    > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_oscillation#Overview says brainwaves are 1-150 Hz? IIRC compassion is acheivable on a bass guitar.

    Doodling improves memory retention / learning, too. IDK how much difference the content of a doodle makes? Hypothesis: Additional "cognitive landmarky" content in the doodle or received waveforms would increase retention up to a limit.

  • by earedpiece on 3/8/22, 5:34 PM

    Makes sense, since Nikola Tesla said, "If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration".

    Probably sound vibrations, create an orchestra which is pleasant for the mind, althogh this is pure speculation.

    I would love top scientist to do more research in this area.

  • by aedocw on 3/8/22, 8:52 PM

    On a MacOS machine with Homebrew, run "brew install sox" and then use this to generate brown noise (or white or pink)

    play -n synth brownnoise gain -25

  • by xtiansimon on 3/8/22, 6:42 PM

  • by bmitc on 3/8/22, 5:03 PM

    I've used these sound machines for years to both sleep and work: https://yogasleep.com/collections/sound-machines/products/do...

    For me personally, white-ish noise has always been a calming factor, which allows me to relax and thus concentrate, if I need to.

  • by gremlinsinc on 3/8/22, 6:06 PM

    I prefer soft 8D audio for concentration/work-mode on alexa speaker.

    If I'm anxious - more upbeat sounds and pop/rock songs like Linkin Park or Imagine Dragons, w/ headphones.

    Closing your eyes is needed and just follow the music as it makes you feel a little dizzy. I never understood 'ASMR' until I found this music thing, really feels trippy. Helps a lot w/ my autism/ADHD.

  • by SubiculumCode on 3/8/22, 5:48 PM

    There are several instances that I know about of machine learning / signal processing methods ( for example empirical mode decomposition) that purposely inject noise into the algorithm to improve accuracy / fidelity / independence. I'm sure that others here can provide better examples than I.

  • by eecc on 3/8/22, 5:11 PM

    I prefer pink (and occasionally punk) noise

  • by tyjen on 3/8/22, 5:20 PM

    Noise in general helps in several area in my life:

      - Working out, pump up music for motivation. 
  - Cleaning or chores, enjoyable music or podcasts for motivation or filling space.
  - Light, shallow work, lo-fi to upbeat chill without vocals for motivation and masking environmental noise.
  - Deep, concentrated work, white or pink noise for masking environmental noise. Depending on the task, I will opt for silence.
    To further explain white or pink noise use benefits in my case, they provide subtle stimulation and are minor distractions if I concentrate on them. However, the utility gained from masking environmental noise exceeds the utility loss in the rare moments that I shift focus to the white or pink noise, so I think it's a net positive for me.

  • by Ensorceled on 3/8/22, 7:46 PM

    I find brain.fm or movie soundtracks work great for study, focus or deep work.

    I've tried white noise and can, like others, attest that brown or pink are better.

  • by thenthenthen on 3/8/22, 6:47 PM

    I enjoy some noise, like fan, AC, but get auditory hallucinations from most ‘noise generators’ (apps). I start to hear voices, orchestras tuning etc. Very strange and distracting. I’m thinking it’s my mind trying to make sense of all the random frequencies? Any tips to counter this? ( I could record my fan and play that... in a loooooong loop ;)

  • by usrbinbash on 3/8/22, 5:21 PM

    White noise is fine and all, but nothing beats a good old 10h Server-Room Humming video.

  • by wenc on 3/8/22, 6:12 PM

    I play brown noise when I work. It really helps.

    I just go “Alexa play brown noise”. It helps my brain filter out noises.

    The only thing it doesn’t work for is barking dogs. For that I have to put on my headphones and play lofi on top of Alexa’s brown noise.

  • by omnicognate on 3/8/22, 6:10 PM

    White noise is horrible to listen to. Brown noise is where it's at. Exponentially smoothed for the connoiseurs, get that soft rumble going.

    White noise is an equal mix of all frequencies. It's what you get from radio static. It's hissy and nasty.

    Brown noise is the sound of things being randomly bumped around (Brownian motion). It's what you get from waterfalls and thunder. It's smooth and delicious.

  • by abnry on 3/8/22, 6:29 PM

    Amusingly, I initially thought this was deep learning related, where if you augment your training set by adding white noise to each sample, then your trained NN will be more robust.

  • by sul_tasto on 3/8/22, 10:47 PM

    can anyone comment on binaural beats and the claim that they can be used to manipulate brain activity- such as promoting focus or relaxation?

  • by amelius on 3/8/22, 4:52 PM

    > dopaminergic midbrain

    Could white noise also help with addiction?

  • by marginalia_nu on 3/8/22, 6:52 PM

    What's the effect size?

  • by sn41 on 3/8/22, 4:48 PM

    i find pink noise more relaxing than white noise when i want to focus.