One night he claimed to have been visited by the ghost of Schubert and wrote down the music that he was hearing. Thereafter, he began making claims that he could hear an angelic choir singing to him. As his condition worsened, the angelic voices developed into demonic ones.Brian Wilson, songwriter and co-founder of the Beach Boys, has schizoaffective disorder that presents itself in the form of disembodied voices. They formed a major component of Bill Pohlads Love & Mercy (2014), a biographical film which depicts Wilsons hallucinations as a source of musical inspiration, constructing songs that were partly designed to converse with them. Wilson has said of the voices: "Mostly [theyre] derogatory. Some of its cheerful. Most of it isnt." To combat them, his psychiatrist advised that he "talk humorously to them", which he says has helped "a little bit".The onset of delusional thinking is most often described as being gradual and insidious. Patients have described an interest in psychic phenomena progressing to increasingly unusual preoccupations and then to bizarre beliefs "in which I believed wholeheartedly". One author wrote of their hallucinations: "they deceive, derange and force me into a world of crippling paranoia". In many cases, the delusional beliefs could be seen as fairly rational explanations for abnormal experiences: "I increasingly heard voices (which Id always call loud thoughts)... I concluded that other people were putting these loud thoughts into my head". Some cases have been described as an "auditory ransom note".
The relationship between an individual and their hallucinations is personal, and everyone interacts with their troubles in different ways. There are those who hear solely malevolent voices, solely benevolent voices, those that hear a mix of the two, and those that see them as either malevolent or benevolent and not believing the voice. Mood disorders and dementias
Mood disorders such as bipolar disorder and major depression have also been known to correlate with auditory hallucinations, but tend to be milder than their psychosis-induced counterpart. Auditory hallucinations are a relatively common sequelae of major neurocognitive disorders (formerly dementia) such as Alzheimers disease. Transient causes
Auditory hallucinations have been known to manifest as a result of intense stress, sleep deprivation, and drug use. Auditory hallucinations can also occur in mentally healthy individuals during the altered state of consciousness while falling asleep (hypnagogic hallucinations) and waking up (hypnopompic hallucinations).High caffeine consumption has been linked to an increase in the likelihood of experiencing auditory hallucinations. A study conducted by the La Trobe University School of Psychological Sciences revealed that as few as five cups of coffee a day could trigger the phenomenon. Intoxication of psychoactive drugs such as PCP, amphetamines, cocaine, marijuana and other substances can produce hallucinations in general, especially in high doses. Withdrawal from certain drugs such as alcohol, sedatives, hypnotics, anxiolytics, and opioids can also produce hallucinations, including auditory. Pathophysiology
The following areas of the brain have been found to be active during auditory hallucinations, through the use of fMRIs.