The Photic Sneeze

Post Reply New Topic

There's this reaction to bright light called the 'photic sneeze'. It's when looking at bright light irritates your nose and triggers the sneeze reflex, due to unusual neural wiring in the brain. I have that, and apparantly only 1% of people have it - wondering if anyone here diagnosed with Asperger syndrome gets that as well - and if there's any correlation, given that they both involve unusual wiring of the brain and neural circuits?

there's a name for it? I've had that forever!

my daughter sneezes every morning when she wakes up - i wonder if this is it

Aylissa - Isn't that morning snuffles? My cousin used to have that - just sneezing to clear the airways after sleep. Or is it when they turn on the light? If it's when the light is turned on in the morning then it could be the photic sneeze - yeah.

Some people can smell ants. Like just walking down the street they say "I smell ants". And sure enough you find an anthill.

Please let me know if this is too off topic. It seems related to sun sneezes to me, but I'm not sure how.

It runs in both my family and my wife's family, but the papers I've seen on it say that close to a quarter of the population have it: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/quer ... ds=3988295 for example.

Every time I walk out to the parking lot at work I sneeze because of the sun reflecting off of cars. I had no idea that such a thing was so rare, though. I thought it happened to everyone!

I can also smell ants. It's hard to describe, though. Kind of like an organic, earthy smell but with a hint of metal.

Last edited by Todd489 on 11 Apr 2007, 7:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Actually, I think they're smelling formic acid, the irritant in ant bites.

DXed ,and yes I sneeze when entering bright light from indoors.I also assumed this was pretty common.

Wow, I didn't know there was a name for it. I've had this problem for as long as I can remember. I'm not officially diagnosed, but I have no doubts that I have AS. My father also had the 'photic sneeze' problem, and I'm convinced he was also an Aspie.

I have serious hyper-sensitivity problems (hearing, smell, taste, bright lights, etc.), so maybe it has to do with that.

I've just looked it up on Wikipedia [not the most reliable source, but interesting nonetheless] which says that:

Also, I always sneeze if I bite a mint, and have no idea if that is a "normal"/common reaction, but this thread reminded me to look it up out of curiosity. In the Photic sneeze reflex article [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photic_sneeze_reflex] Wikipedia says:



This may be entirely common/"normal" also, but whenever I tug at my cheek in a certain place, it tingles and makes me sneeze. Does anyone else experience that? Perhaps it is one of the reasons people don't usually walk around tugging at their faces.. lol

I have this as well as my husband and daughter. I'm undiagnosed AS. Our son, Dx'd HFA, does not get this.

This also happens sometimes when I pluck my eyebrow hairs that are closest to my nose.

Same. It doesn't make any difference how close to my nose it is though, anything tingly on my face seems to make me sneeze. Either way, it's really annoying to sneeze when you have tweezers so close to your eyes.

I've always had that! Is it an Aspie thing?

Occasionally, I will sneeze for no apparent reason if I am out in bright sunlight. When this happens, I will also get feeling similar to the feeling that most people get when hearing fingernails scraping a chalkboard. --This doesn't happen often.