Jaw Dysfunction Hypothesis

These are my most up-to-date thoughts on a jaw-dysfunction driven model of misophonia.

Summary

The recent research on orofacial mirroring combined with my own jaw-related triggers, and the general prevalence of mouth-related sound triggers, makes me think there might be an element of objective physical jaw and/or airway dysfunction behind some or all misophonia.

I have gone back and forth on this, but my current position is that it is worthy of further exploration.

Testing the hypothesis

Study

As a first step, I suggest a study comparing misophonia presence and severity against a handful of relevant jaw health measurements such as:

  • Number of adult teeth & general orthodontic health: bite, crowding, bruxism, etc.

  • TMJD (jaw clicking and/or pain).

  • Tongue tie.

  • Snoring, sleep apnea/hypopnea, UARS.

The hypothesis is about jaw, airway, and myofunctional health as defined by orthotropic principles. Therefore, complex and subjective assessments, such as tongue tie identification and overall craniofacial development, should be carried out by an orthotropically-inclined, airway-focused orthodontist or oral-maxillofacial surgeon.

The fact that current medical understanding of these jaw-development issues is evolving rapidly—we are only beginning to understand the full implications of tongue tie, for example—makes this an especially exciting area for new research.

By counter-example

It is also worth noting that it would be relatively simple for someone to disprove the hypothesis: if you have a healthy airway and suffer from misophonia, then the hypothesis is false. If you think you can disprove it in this way, please email me at gus@gushogg-blake.com.

For & against

For

  • Overlap: at least in my case, there is enough overlap between signs and symptoms of objective jaw dysfunction in both myself and others, and my lifelong misophonia triggers and responses, to rule out coincidence.

  • Explanatory power: objective jaw dysfunction is a good natural candidate for explaining a predominantly jaw-related psychological issue.

Against

  • Non-orofacial triggers: these would require potentially elaborate or complex explanations under a jaw-driven model.

Raises questions

  • Genetic markers: this genome-wide association study found a genetic marker associated with the questionnaire item “the sound of otherpeople chewing fills me with rage”, which suggests some kind of genetic influence.

  • Possibility of it being my case only: although I’ve said that I don’t think the correspondence between jaw dysfunction and my own misophonia can be explained by coincidence, it is possible that the two have become so intertwined in my case by a mechanism that is specific to me and not fundamental to misophonia in general.

Posts in relevant subreddits

To test the waters on this hypothesis, last year I posted in r/misophonia about jaw health and in r/orthotropics about misophonia: