The Auditory Illusion of Silence: Study Reveals People Hear It

A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that people perceive silence as a form of sound, challenging the notion that silence is simply the absence of sound. Researchers conducted auditory illusion tests and found that participants perceived silences in a similar way to how they perceive sounds. The study indicates that silence is experienced as its own type of "sound" and not just as a gap between noises. While the study does not explain how the brain processes silence, it suggests that hearing is more complex than just perceiving sounds.