Why do we sometimes get goosebumps due to certain sounds - e.g. chalk or nails squeaking across a chalkboard or sandpaper?

star_gazer

Guessing that the whole thing may have had something to do with our monkey ancestors--looked at in the proper light, just about everything has something to do with our monkey ancestors--the researchers compared the waveforms of the scraping noise with those of the warning cries of macaque monkeys. The two sounds, they decided, closely resembled one another. Ergo, Blake writes in Psychology Today, "we speculate that our spine-tingling aversion to sounds like fingernails scraped over a surface may be a vestigial reflex" inherited from our primate forebears. http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/540/why-is-the-sound-of-fingernails-scraping-a-blackboard-so-annoying May 30 11, 10:22 AM

AdamM7

star_gazer - "monkey ancesters" is wrong, we came from homonids, and monkeys also came from homonids. Although we are closely related to them we did not come from monkeys. Back to the question, goosebumps are used in many animals to keep warm, and also appear in many animals when they appear threatened for instance, cats get goosebumps when chased by a dog. People tend to experience goosebumps in emotional situations, when one is about to get married or even when one watches a scary horror movie. Goosebumps can also appear if one thinks about a previous emotional situation, and sounds can trigger these responses. If someone listened to the song that played when they were walking down the aisle, they might remember their wedding, and get goosebumps. Goosebumps may appear when one hears a sound that makes them cautious, such as a lion growling. Chalk squeaking across a chalkboard may not cause goosebumps out of fear, but out of disgust. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100811154050AANykoK May 30 11, 11:04 AM