Synesthesia
You may have heard of those people who can see or even taste music. It sounds impossibly far-fetched to a person who has never experienced it. Synesthesia is a fascinating condition in which a person’s sensory perception is simultaneously and involuntarily amalgamated. Basically, when something is experienced (say they hear something) this leads to an automatic experience of another sense (like taste).
The most common type of synesthesia is that in which people see letters or numbers as having a tinge of color or shading to them. But perhaps one of the more popular examples of this phenomenon is seeing music. People with synesthesia in which their hearing and sight are linked will often report of seeing colors when hearing the music. This condition is not just limited to music, seeing colors when looking at numbers or days of the week has also been reported. There are multiple types of synesthetes that exist.
Honestly being able to see or taste music sounds pretty cool at first, however not all people who experience it have pleasant experiences all the time. Charles Spence a psychologist from Oxford University found that sweet tastes are associated with higher notes, while bitter tastes are associated with the lower pitched notes. Spence gave each of his research volunteers a piece of candy. All the candy was exactly the same, however when he asked them to rate the candy’s sweetness their answer differed with a correlation being found between the pitch of the note and the perceived sweetness of the candy.
This study suggests that our senses may not be as separate as we tend to think they are. Perhaps you have had the experience of being scared and suddenly losing the taste in your mouth. Chances are that whatever scared you had little to do with your ability to taste, but it was impacted just the same.