Experts explain phantom cellphone vibration

Ever experienced trying to answer your vibrating cellphone only to find out that it wasn’t vibrating at all? Apparently there’s a name for this condition. Some call it “vibranxiety”, others prefer to call it by the more important sounding term, “phantom vibration syndrome”.

Others have wondered, and even worried, if there are any physical reasons for this phenomenon. They think that perhaps it may be caused by muscle memory or even nerve damage. Thankfully, experts say that this is simply a demonstration of how easily our brains form habits.

Alejandro Lleras, a sensation and perception professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, says that perceiving rings and vibrations is part of our perceptual learning process. He expounds:

When we learn to respond to a cellphone, we’re setting perceptual filters so that we can pick out that (ring or vibration), even under noisy conditions… As the filter is created, it is imperfect, and false alarms will occur. Random noise is interpreted as a real signal, when in fact, it isn’t.

Jeffrey Janata, director of the behavioral medicine program at University Hospitals in Cleveland adds,

Neurological connections that have been used or formed by the sensation of vibrating are easily activated… They’re over-solidified, and similar sensations are incorporated into that template. They become a habit of the brain.

USAToday reports that as far as the cellphone companies are concerned, cellphones cannot sporadically vibrate on their own. Mark Siegel of AT&T says that all this vibration is perhaps “in the mind of the cellphone user only.”

Given all this talk about vibrating cellphones not really vibrating, this blogger recalls that years ago in the ancient days of dial-up, he used to hear dial-up modem noises all the time. *Tssshriri~~~ng… beep… beep…*

What about you folks? Any “phantom” things you notice? Do you hear “monster kill” ring in your head when you go on a frag spree even if you’re not playing Unreal? Do you hear the “overworld theme” from Legend of Zelda whenever you walk in an open field? Pavlovian conditioning is funny that way, huh?

Ever experienced trying to answer your vibrating cellphone only to find out that it wasn’t vibrating at all? Apparently there’s a name for this condition. Some call it “vibranxiety”, others prefer to call it by the more important sounding term, “phantom vibration syndrome”.

Others have wondered, and even worried, if there are any physical reasons for this phenomenon. They think that perhaps it may be caused by muscle memory or even nerve damage. Thankfully, experts say that this is simply a demonstration of how easily our brains form habits.

Alejandro Lleras, a sensation and perception professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, says that perceiving rings and vibrations is part of our perceptual learning process. He expounds:

When we learn to respond to a cellphone, we’re setting perceptual filters so that we can pick out that (ring or vibration), even under noisy conditions… As the filter is created, it is imperfect, and false alarms will occur. Random noise is interpreted as a real signal, when in fact, it isn’t.

Jeffrey Janata, director of the behavioral medicine program at University Hospitals in Cleveland adds,

Neurological connections that have been used or formed by the sensation of vibrating are easily activated… They’re over-solidified, and similar sensations are incorporated into that template. They become a habit of the brain.

USAToday reports that as far as the cellphone companies are concerned, cellphones cannot sporadically vibrate on their own. Mark Siegel of AT&T says that all this vibration is perhaps “in the mind of the cellphone user only.”

Given all this talk about vibrating cellphones not really vibrating, this blogger recalls that years ago in the ancient days of dial-up, he used to hear dial-up modem noises all the time. *Tssshriri~~~ng… beep… beep…*

What about you folks? Any “phantom” things you notice? Do you hear “monster kill” ring in your head when you go on a frag spree even if you’re not playing Unreal? Do you hear the “overworld theme” from Legend of Zelda whenever you walk in an open field? Pavlovian conditioning is funny that way, huh?