Many people are aware that hearing voices can be a symptom of such serious mental illnesses as schizophrenia. But hearing voices that others don’t hear isn’t always caused by disease. Approximately three to seven percent of healthy people hear voices regularly and 10 percent say they have heard voices at some point in their lives.
Philip Corlett, PhD and Albert Powers, MD, PhD, are conducting a study to find out what happens in the brains of those who hear voices whether or not they have symptoms of a psychotic illness. “We’re really interested in how hallucinations happen in general and we have a good idea about what parts of the brain might be working together to make them happen,” said Dr. Powers. Using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain, he and Dr. Corlett hope to understand how different parts of the brain communicate with one another to cause hallucinations to arise.
The nature of the auditory hallucinations the Yale doctors are studying is different than those experienced by someone with schizophrenia, which tend to be unpleasant and persistent. Some people who hear these types of voices may believe they are hearing God speak to them directly, others believe they are psychic, while still others try to ignore the voices, sometimes successfully.
Dr. Powers aims to study this phenomenon in a diverse group of participants that includes men, women, and minorities, who are underrepresented in clinical research. “It’s important for minorities to be represented in clinical research because the results of that research only pertain to the types of people who are in the studies,” said Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith, deputy director of health equity research and workforce development for the Yale Center for Clinical Investigation. “People of color are potentially missing out on being at the table in discovery that’s relevant to them and their communities when they aren’t part of clinical research.”
We’re really interested in how hallucinations happen in general and we have a good idea about what parts of the brain might be working together to make them happen.
Dr. Albert Powers
By studying voice hearing in otherwise healthy people, Dr. Powers and his colleagues hope to shed light on how they arise in this group, as well as in people with schizophrenia. “It could help us alleviate hallucinations that are really terrible for people in psychiatric populations, a really vulnerable patient population in society,” he said.
Study participants will be compensated for their time. For more information on the auditory hallucinations study, contact Dr. Powers at albert.powers@yale.edu.