When 22-year-old college student Abby Webster watches ASMR to fall asleep, she takes special precautions. "I have a roommate, and I angle my laptop away because I'm like, 'I don't want anyone to see this,'" she says.
You'll find similar confessions throughout the comments sections of ASMR videos on YouTube. "Who else hides ASMR like it's a drug," asks one user under a video from creator Gibi ASMR. The comment has 13,000 likes and 500 replies, including one that reads, "People know I do drugs. Nobody knows I watch ASMR."
What about ASMR, the pseudo-scientific phenomenon of relaxing sound and visual triggers, is so embarrassing? Webster herself isn't quite sure. "I know my roommate wouldn't care… it's just an irrational shame." She has recently been watching a sub genre of ASMR in which repetitive hand movements are used to relax the viewer and admits, "I'm imagining me looking at someone watching somebody movie their hands on YouTube, and I would be like… huh."
Rogelio (we've changed his name at his request), a 25-year-old tire shop mechanic and psychology student, stumbled on an analysis of the video game Portal done in ASMR around two years ago. "I was like, 'What the fuck is this? I like this. I need more of this.'" But he says there is a dividing line between those who can understand ASMR and those that don't. "Either they just think it's voice or sounds or they think you're a creep," Rogelio says, "It's one of two sides."
Webster has never met anyone who openly talks about liking the genre. "I don't think anybody's ever said that to me," she laughs. "I've talked to my friends who don't get it at all and I'm like, 'I can't explain this to you… You either get it or you don't.' They just think it's really weird… that it has like, some sexual connotation to it or something… Since they don't actually get what other people get from it, [they think] 'there must be something going on here.'"
ASMR, an acronym for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, taps its well-manicured nails in the gray areas of relaxation and pleasure, and that's why a lot of people like it. Most ASMR triggers simulate physical and emotional closeness through whispering, eye contact, and other expressions of care usually reserved for interpersonal relationships.
But while ASMR is inherently intimate, it is not always sexual. The genre is not exempt from the universal truth that if it exists, there is porn of it. And there is ASMR porn. But, as performer Penny Barber recently told Mashable, there was also an abundance of fidget spinner porn in the toy's recent heyday.
For Webster, ASMR is part of a nighttime routine that also involves watching K-pop dance covers on repeat "to the point where my eyes would glaze over and I would zone out" and playing "little ambient games" like Pokémon GO or Subway Surfer. "I just need to do something mindless… you know those baby sensory videos on YouTube? That's me watching dance practices." And to the end, ASMR "is just a useful tool in my life."
The genre is a tool for others, too. Asking for consent to "touch" a viewer, a widely adopted practice among creators who make ASMR content, called ASMRtists, has helped create a safe space for intimacy. ASMR has been used by sexual assault survivors as a way to heal. And ASMRtists often make videos specifically to help with depression, anxiety, and insomnia.
From there, you can slide all the way across the spectrum — past wooden block tapping and fantasy role plays — to ASMRotica.
In the middle are ear-licking sounds, a trigger neither Webster nor Rogelio can stand but that ASMRtist Frivolous Fox has built a successful career on.
ASMRtist LunaRexx makes YouTube videos titled "ASMR for men." Her content has helped popularize the "you're laying in my lap" trend with thumbnails that prominently feature her cleavage. She adds a disclaimer under every video: "This ASMR video is not meant for fetishization or sexualization purposes. My ASMR videos are meant to help you sleep and for relaxation purposes." She also links readers to her age-restricted Patreon, where she posts "lewd ASMR" and "cosplay-themed photo sets and content."
As Rogelio notes, that's totally OK. "That's her market. She plays her niche." And if it helps someone fall asleep, so what? He admits that attractiveness matters. "I am but a simple creature. So it's like, 'Oh, you're an attractive person. I'm gonna click on your video and see if I like it… And we're going to go from there'... YouTube is thumbnails, right? It's clickbait, it works. At the end of the day, it is an entertainment field… There's a reason people on TV look better than me. And it doesn't bother me."
Rogelio doesn't talk about ASMR with anyone. Not with his fiancé, or the guys at the tire shop where he works at, or at the school where he is getting his degree in psychology. "I'm talking to you in my car," he admits, "Because my fiancé is in my room and my cousin and his fiancé live with us. And I'm not going to have this conversation in the house."
He often screen records funny social media posts to send to his family. To start and stop recording, he slides down a control panel that includes a widget showing what he's currently listening to. Every time, "I edit [that part of the video] off so none of them can see that I'm listening to 'ASMR haircuts for men.'" Once one of my cousin's finds out you're listening to this girl with her boobs out giving you a haircut, that's gonna make its way around very quick," he laughs. "I have a Hispanic family, there's a lot of chismosa going around."
One of Rogelio's favorite videos to fall asleep to is this collection of lullabies from ASMR Glow.
Marisa Peer, a therapist and best-selling author, says positive reactions to the intimacy of ASMR are "completely normal" and almost "childlike." "Many people first experience ASMR as a child when having a story read to them or their forehead or hair stroked," she points out. But as we grow older — and intimacy becomes associated with sex — guilt and shame creep in and muddy the waters. What was once comforting is now confusing.
Add to this confusion the fact that ASMR is not a universal experience, that people who don't experience ASMR are skeptical of it, that it's something enjoyed in private, and that parts of the genre have been publicly demonized, and it starts to feel like something you should keep to yourself. "People often feel shame or guilt about something if they think it is abnormal… There is an innate human desire to find connection and avoid rejection. If someone already considers themselves odd because they enjoy ASMR, they are not going to share this with anyone at the risk of being judged and having their shame endorsed."
"Forgiving ourselves is an important step in leaving feelings of shame behind," says Peer. "We are allowed to feel good!" While ASMR is not yet backed by research, Peer notes that "sound therapy is a proven, natural method for relaxation and healing… It is no different from how we respond to other sounds or sensations — gentle spa music, a babbling brook, the wind in the trees or a clock ticking — [that] rest our autonomic nervous systems and help us relax." Finding online communities that celebrate the genre — like on Reddit or the YouTube comments section — will make fans of ASMR feel less alone.
Rogelio says he'd feel less ashamed about his ASMR habits "if the stigma changed from creepy to lame. It doesn't need to go positive… I like lame things, and I acknowledge and accept that. I love professional wrestling. [It’s the] lamest shit in the world, and everyone knows it. I'll be lame. I'll be weird. I'll be different. I don't want to be creepy."
Millions of people watch both pro wrestling and ASMR, but only one is broadcast on national television.
Ads from brands that employ ASMR, like this one from IKEA, have helped move ASMR towards mainstream recognition.
Peer notes that the more mainstream ASMR gets, "the more normalised and less of a guilty secret this will become." Over the past few years, the genre has flirted heavily with mainstream popularity, featuring in Super Bowl commercials and as fodder for A-list celebrities promoting new projects. But it still wades in liminality.
Ben Deaney manages brand partnerships for a long roster of YouTube's top ASMRtists through his company Human Media Group. He is also the husband of Gibi ASMR, one of the genre's most popular creators. HMG works with brands like Dollar Shave Club, Helix, and Honey. When pitching, Deaney says "I've really needed to be data driven in order to push past what the content is." But when brands finally "get it," the sell is easy. The same goes for people.
"[When I go to bed] I put a fan on when it's like 20 degrees in Chicago, because I like the sound of it on, I like feeling a little breeze," he says. ASMR is just like that. "It's a really important part of [a routine] for a lot of people," he adds. "I think once you, yourself, understand [that] you have something that kind of fits in that same vein… you can dismiss anyone that is trying to ASMR shame or be like 'that's weird'... For people that don't understand it they're like, ‘What is this?’ It's fight or flight rather than like, just chill, relax. Enjoy it. That's the whole point."
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