Interview: Dr. Solena Mednicoff, Misophonia Research Fund

Solena Mednicoff, Ph.D., is a neuroscientist and communicator, and is currently the Research and Communications Manager for the Misophonia Research Fund. Dr. Mednicoff holds a Ph.D. in Cognitive Sciences and a Master's in Cognitive Neuroscience from the University of California Irvine.

1. The Piano Performance Minor That Started It All

Question: Dr. Mednicoff, you have a unique background that combines neuroscience with a minor in piano performance from University of Nevada, Reno.

Looking back, was there a specific moment during your musical training when you first noticed how differently people react to sounds—maybe a classmate who couldn't handle certain practice room acoustics or your own visceral reactions to off-key playing?

And how did that musical sensitivity training actually prepare you for understanding the complex auditory world of misophonia in teens who are already navigating heightened emotional responses?

Answer: Yes! There was actually a specific moment in high school that made me realize how much I appreciated how music could make me feel – and in turn made me realize how music affects the body and mind. I wanted to understand whether other people were moved by music in the same way.

Before attending Reno, I attended a performing arts high school, where piano performance was also my major.

My psychology teacher there introduced us to foundational concepts in psychology and neuroscience, which helped to foster my desire to connect music with medicine and ultimately dictated my journey through undergraduate and doctoral degrees.

2. The Graduate School Social Media Campaign Deep Cut

Question: Your work creating social media campaigns and student spotlight content at UC Irvine's Graduate Division is fascinating—you were essentially translating complex academic experiences into digestible stories.

Here's what I want to know: when you were interviewing graduate students for those campaigns, did you ever encounter someone who mentioned struggling with classroom sounds, study environments, or dining hall acoustics?

And now that you're working with teens and misophonia, how do you think social media could be used as a tool for young people to find community and validation around their sound sensitivities, rather than feeling isolated by them?

Answer: That’s a very interesting question! I did not encounter someone like that, but I wonder if that could be because at that time, I was transitioning to interviewing people online rather than in person due to Covid shutdowns.

Because of this, many graduate students and postdoctoral researchers had to find community online and pivot to social media as a result, so I believe there can be many connections for teens to find a community through social media!

Of course, teens should be proactive with their parents in sharing sensitive information online, but I see social media as a way to connect with others through shared interests while also creating a safe space for people to express themselves and find validation around their sound sensitivities.

I did learn from my experience at UCI that it helps when there is a group (like the UCI Graduate Division) that is leading the way to facilitate building this community.

3. The ASMR and Musical Chills Connection Nobody Saw Coming

Question: Your research exploring the relationship between misophonia and positive auditory experiences like ASMR and musical chills is genuinely groundbreaking.

Teenagers are huge consumers of ASMR content on YouTube and TikTok, often using it for anxiety relief and sleep.

Are you finding that teens with misophonia have a more complex relationship with these "feel-good" sounds?

Like, could a teen who's triggered by their family's chewing at dinner actually find solace in deliberate mouth sounds in ASMR videos? And what does that paradox tell us about how their brains are wired?

Answer: Teens absolutely have a complex relationship with these sounds, along with reporting these sounds.

We include two types of questions when asking about misophonia, ASMR and musical chills experiences for all of our participants.

The first is a self-report question asking whether they have experienced ASMR or musical chills, with a definition of each, or the A-MISO-S scale to determine their misophonia severity (or our equivalent child A-MISO-S scale that we created before the validation of the A-MISO-SY was published).

The second is an objective measure where we ask participants to press a button each time they have a reaction (positive or negative) towards a video that is meant to induce an ASMR, musical chills, or misophonic reaction (with prompts reminding them that they may leave at any time).

Interestingly, we did not find a correlation between the child version of the A-MISO-S and ASMR self-report (r=0.03), but we did find one between the child version of the A-MISO-S and their ASMR reactions (r=0.32).

This highlights that although children and teens may say one thing, their genuine reactions may be saying something different! Something interesting about this topic is that when I’ve had conversations with adults with misophonia, many have found anecdotally that if they are triggered, they will search for an ASMR video of their trigger to help calm them down.

It is almost as if having an aspect of control can help their symptoms – but research is still needed to find out if this truly helps!

4. The Family Dinner Table Revelation

Question: The Misophonia Research Fund was founded by parents whose daughter began exhibiting harsh reactions to chewing sounds at the dinner table.

As someone who studies the development of misophonic reactions, you know that family meals often become battlegrounds for teens with misophonia.

Here's my question: when parents come to you saying their teenager has started having "attitude problems" at dinner, how do you help them distinguish between typical adolescent behavior and genuine neurological distress? And what's the most heartbreaking family dynamic you've encountered where misophonia was initially misunderstood as defiance?

Answer: I think parents have a hard time making this distinction between typical adolescent behavior and genuine neurological distress because misophonia is not recognized in the DSM or ICD yet.

Once misophonia is recognized with diagnostic criteria and there is more awareness surrounding the disorder, I think parents will shift their thinking from assuming typical adolescent behavior to questioning if there is genuine neurological distress happening, which will open doors for the entire family to help understand what the teenager is experiencing.

I think the most heartbreaking family dynamic I’ve encountered is when the teenager and family cannot sit and eat a meal together. There is tension on both sides, and each side feels guilty about wanting to ease the tension for the other. Usually this is initially seen as defiance in not wanting to eat or being picky when we now know it is a much different problem then that.

5. The Major vs. Minor Music Research Plot Twist

Question: Your dissertation research on how people process major versus minor musical modes is fascinating, especially since you found that even extensive training doesn't improve performance for most listeners on tone-scramble tasks.

Here's where it gets interesting for teens with misophonia: adolescence is when many people develop their strongest musical identities and emotional connections to music.

Are you seeing any patterns where teens with misophonia have altered relationships with major versus minor keys, or specific musical elements that either soothe or trigger them in unexpected ways?

Answer: That is an excellent question. When I last looked at the data, something I found interesting was that compared to other age groups, teenagers seemed to be doing better at this task compared to younger children as well as adults.

This could be a result of a few possibilities. First, as you said, this age is when many people develop their strongest musical identities and emotional connections to music. As a result, teenagers may be listening more closely and be much more familiar with music during this time.

Alternatively, this is a study that recruited children and teenagers about their emotional connection to sounds, and the participants in this study may have happened to be more sensitive to all sounds and consequently be better at musical tasks, resulting in better performance on this task than other age groups. This would need to be verified in another sample to check this possibility.

Regardless, a relationship has not been found between performance on this task and misophonia symptoms. If there is no relationship between musical task performance and misophonia severity, this means that music could eventually be used as a treatment for misophonia, which is a promising result.

6. The Communications Manager Real Talk

Question: You went from being a postdoctoral researcher to becoming the Research and Communications Manager at MRF—essentially becoming the bridge between complex scientific research and the people who desperately need answers.

What’s the most challenging question you've gotten from a teenager or parent about misophonia that made you realize how much we still don't know? And how do you balance giving hope and realistic expectations when you're explaining current research limitations to a family whose teen is struggling to function at school because of sound sensitivities?

Answer: The most challenging and most common question we have received from parents are some variation of: “My son/daughter has misophonia and we need help now. What can I do for them, and who can I reach out to?”

This has been the most challenging because, as you know, there currently is no cure for misophonia.

Yes, there is research looking into effective treatments for misophonia, but as of right now, there is no one-size-fits-all approach that we can offer people who may be suffering. I try to balance giving hope to people by sharing what misophonia research may have just been published, along with MRF’s current project of sharing short-form articles of the research articles so anyone and everyone can understand them.

I think it is hard to access a lot of the research that is coming out, not only because of the pay wall that the research may be behind, but also because of the language that scientists use within their publications. We want to make these articles accessible for the misophonia community so they are aware of the research that scientists are working on.

7. The General Population Study Bombshell

Question: Your recent research showing that misophonic experiences are actually common in the general population is huge for destigmatizing the condition.

But here's what I'm curious about: teenagers are already dealing with feeling "different" and not fitting in.

When you tell teens that misophonia exists on a spectrum and many people experience some level of sound sensitivity, does that actually help them feel less alone, or does it minimize their experience when their reactions are more severe? How do you navigate that delicate balance in your communications?

Answer: We have been able to say that misophonic experiences are common in the general population in adults, but haven’t yet quantified this with children and teenagers.

That’s a question we are aiming to answer in the next study that we are working on.

But to hear this if you are a teenager experiencing misophonia and are feeling “different” and like you’re not fitting in, will be monumental.  

8. The Vision That Keeps You Going

Question: The Misophonia Research Fund's vision is literally "to end suffering from misophonia." That's a bold, ambitious goal. As someone who's now at the intersection of cutting-edge research and direct communication with affected families, I have to ask: what does "ending suffering" actually look like for a teenager with misophonia?

Are we talking about a cure, better coping strategies, environmental accommodations, or something else entirely? And when you're having a tough day in research—maybe a study didn't yield the results you hoped for—what specific image of a teen living freely without sound-related distress keeps you motivated to keep pushing the science forward?

Answer: That is a great question. “Ending suffering” can take form by encompassing many of what you mention.

Ideally, ending suffering would mean finding a cure for misophonia and not having to do this important work anymore. As of right now, ending suffering does mean finding better coping strategies and enabling accommodations while scientists are researching what misophonia is and how it can be treated.

Research does take time, so I think it is very important to stay motivated while the science is being pushed forward. For me, as you know how passionate I am about music, what helped to motivate me was the idea of and imagining using music as medicine to help people.

Using music as medicine has always been one of my personal research goals, and I hope it can be used to help people with misophonia.