"It's Like Fresh Air in My Ears": Can Brown Noise Really Help You Concentrate?

There's a new buzz on TikTok - well, not exactly a buzz. It's more of a hum, maybe crashing waves, a purring fan, or a steady heavy rain. To me, it looks like an empty plane, peacefully cruising at altitude. It's brown noise, a close cousin of the better-known white noise, and TikTok users, especially the platform's ADHD community, are everywhere: there are 85.3 million views for the #brownnoise hashtag. /p>

Highest rated video (1.3 million views) shows user @NatalyaBubb trying out brown noise. At first she seems surprised, then bewitched. "Where did all those thoughts go?" read the caption on her wide-eyed face. Commenters on her and other brown noise clips are mostly – but not exclusively – thrilled. "I closed my eyes and literally thought about NOTHING...it makes my brain soft in the best possible way"; "It was like fresh air to my ears"; "Like a soft weighted blanket that I safely wrapped my brain in," says a writer with ADHD.

The 'brown' in brown noise doesn't is not a color, but a reference to sound that mimics Brownian motion, the movement that pollen makes in water, identified by botanist Robert Brown in 1827. Essentially, brown noise is the familiar, static sound of white noise. (i.e. all frequencies audible simultaneously) but with the low frequency notes increased and the less pleasant high frequency notes reduced, counteracting the natural tendency of the human ear to hear high frequencies louder. /p>

"Brown noise is a more palatable listen because most of the high frequencies, which can be harsh or distracting to the listener, are removed," says Giles Williams , musical director of commercial music service Rehegoo.

He has fans beyond the ADHD community, including author Zadie Smith. "I listen to brown noise...day and night," she told a Penguin podcast. "I live in this bare soundscape." My colleague Nikola discovered brown noise in college. “I could only concentrate in cafes. When I was poor and couldn't afford to go to a coffee shop, I tried to find coffee sounds on YouTube and then found something called "brown noise for concentration". Since then, I've been using it whenever my mind is going all out and I need to work. night ("I can't sleep without it," said one. "It helps me not wake up suddenly with every little noise," said another.) You can get eight o'clock on CBeebies radio and some Tinnitus sufferers find that it reduces their symptoms. According to Williams, it's now seen as "a viable option for use in deep relaxation rooms or sleep pods" for wellness businesses wanting to get away from whale song.

The static sound of white noise has been shown to improve sleep and certain cognitive tasks in children with ADHD; "White noise" machines have been around since the 1960s. Are there the same proven benefits with brown noise?

Dan Berlau, professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the Regis University of Colorado, reviewed the literature on the benefits of white noise. "I don't think there's anything magical about brown noise," he tells me. "I think all of these sounds can have similar effects on the brain, but people love how brown noise sounds like, so that's the one that's grabbing the attention. It seems like, for this ADHD community on TikTok , they identified brown noise as something that helps them, which is great."

What people actually feel when they listen to brown noise is not unclear. Research has not yet investigated the soothing, “thoughtless” response to brown noise described by the TikTok ADHD community. However, I...