[Michell (OP)]

I know that you guys are way smarter than me, so you'll have to excuse the crude way I word this, but I can feel it in my brain when a tv comes on or computers. Sometimes when I scan radio stations, I can feel certain stations likes waves hitting my head--is it radio waves? I saw an earlier post from 2009 (Karsten I think was her name) where she can get a clearer picture or signal from the tv/radio when she came near it or placed her hand on it--I can do that too. A lot of times I'm not even in the same room or walking down the hallway & sense the TV is on, even when I'm driving I sometimes feel like a TV was just turned on somewhere, but I don't see anything but open space--is that a satellite dish or something? I feel it the strongest when a TV/computer is first turned on--maybe after then I get used to it, I don't know, but with the certain radio stations I always feel it as long as it is on that particular station (it's gone as soon as I turn it). Also, I had on a wireless headset the other day & felt the waves when going through the sensors at the library, but not all the other times I've gone through there without one. I only feel it in my head, no where else in my body. After reading Karsten's topic & the responses, I'm hope that there is just as simple an explaination for me. Thanks in advance.

[CliffordK]

I don't think it is uncommon for your body to interfere with TV/Radio reception, either positive or negative, but it make it frustrating to adjust the antenna as the station can drift whenever you move.  This is especially common with the old "rabbit ears".

Your TV should be a passive device, so your body wouldn't know which one of hundreds of broadcast stations it is tuned into.

My guess that your body is reacting to a sound, or a hum that your TV is putting out, perhaps at the extreme end of sound perception.  Or, perhaps even light emissions.  It is possible to see lights flickering in a house, and to know that it is are being caused by a TV.

It is also possible for a person to imagine a personal connection to an electronic device, when in fact none exists.  This might be interpreted as hallucinations, and could be a symptom of a cognitive illness.

[RD]

Allegedly there is “electromagnetic sensitivity syndrome”, where people allege radio transmissions are causing them to experience symptoms … http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_sensitivity#Scientific_evidence_and_etiology

But IMO people who say they are affected by radio TV transmission have a physical or mental illness whose symptoms they are incorrectly attributing to radio/TV/cellphone transmissions, e.g. migraine* epilepsy* or schizophrenia.

[ * looking at flickering display on a computer / TV / LED display, or a flickering pattern caused by movement,
 (e.g. sun through a fence), a could trigger migraine or epilepsy]

[Michell (OP)]

I don't hear anything when this happens, including voices, no hallucinations and it doesn't make me sick at all--I guess I should have made that more clear. So I'm either crazy, got some kind of physical problem or migraine, etc.....I see. After reading these responses I am feel even more blessed to have a wonderful, smart & amazing man like my husband in my life--at least you have helped me to love & appreciate him more, if that was even possible. Thanks at least for that.

[rosy]

I'd go with Clifford, and guess that you're probably detecting a noise outside your "hearing" range...

A few years ago I used to go quite regularly (because it was where my bloke was living at the time) to a house where if I went in through the front door I felt really uncomfortable, almost physically so, in a way I found very hard to pin down. When someone brought their dog to visit the house, and the dog was clearly distressed by coming in the front drive, we realised it was one of those high-pitched-noise emitting devices used to disuade cats (and sometimes teenagers) from hanging about in a particular garden (or shopping centre, station, etc). Once I knew what it was I realised I could, sort-of, hear it, right up on the edge of my hearing. Not a physcial problem, or a symptom of going mad, just a noise that the people around me weren't hearing (I'm 5 years younger than my boyfriend, and we lose perception of high frequencies with age*, so he'd probably lost that frequency before then).

Different people so seem to be more or less sensitive to different pitches (even discounting the loss of high frequencies with age), I have wondered if it explains why some people find the noise of (say) vacuum cleaners so very distressing.

* Off topic, but when my gran was very old and deaf, and slightly batty, she used to make much more sense when talking to my dad or my brother than when talking to me, my sister, or our mum (her daughter). It took us a little time to realise that she wasn't quite as mad as we thought, she just couldn't hear the (higher pitched) voices of her female relatives as well as the (deeper) voices of our menfolk.. after that we all tried to be as low-pitched as possible, instead of shouting, because it turned out to work better.

[RD]

If you want to test if hearing a specific sound frequency is causing the symptom(s) here is a link to a sound sweep across the audible frequency range which you can listen to … http://beta.freesound.org/people/reaktorplayer/sounds/94224/ 
 (the triangular play button to hear the sound is on the bottom left corner of the multicoloured waveform display).

Some frequencies will sound louder than others, that is normal. 

Ideally you should listen to the sound using the same computer and headset that you used previously when you experienced the symptoms, as the higher frequency limit of different brands of headphones and computer sound cards varies.

[Airthumbs]

RD, I just listened to that sound sweep and I have a question for you.  Will my speakers play the whole of this sound spectrum? 

[RD]

RD, I just listened to that sound sweep and I have a question for you.  Will my speakers play the whole of this sound spectrum? 

There may be problems beyond about 16KHz, the Freesound.org online player may have sacrificed the almost inaudible high end of the sound spectrum to minimize bandwidth. You may get better results if you download the sweep audio file from Freesound.org and play it using a media player on your computer.

Alternatively I've made a sine sweep which can be downloaded from here where the frequency is X KHz at X seconds, e.g.
if everthing goes quiet at say 15 seconds then for some reason you can hear above 15KHz.

Usually people over 40 years old can't hear above about 16KHz, but the computer soundcard or headphones/speakers could be the limiting factor.

[CliffordK]

Interesting.

At about 15 seconds, the sound goes away, then it comes back at higher frequencies...  presumably due to my computer and speakers struggling with the playing of the highest frequencies.

My Grandmother used to have a mouse chaser.  It was supposed to emit a sound above the frequency of human hearing.  I don't know if it was ever effective, but I found that it was extraordinary annoying.

[Airthumbs]

If I can hear all of the sound sweep, which I can, then am I a mouse?

[RD]

At about 15 seconds, the sound goes away, then it comes back at higher frequencies.

When the sound comes back in after having gone silent, you are then hearing artifacts which are at a lower frequency, e.g. if the sound is turned up loud the sine wave is slightly distorted, the distortions are at a lower frequency and can be heard when the sine wave frequency is too high to be audible.