Creativity, such as engaging in visual art, is powerful in ways that we’re only just starting to fully understand in neuroscience – and you don’t need to be an artist to experience the potential benefits. Cognitive scientist @katherinetemplarlewis explains 🎨
In this episode of Kinda Conversations, we explore Sonic Bodies - the idea that our connection to sound as an embodied experience and what that means through the lens of neuroscience, and the implications for our wellbeing.
Bringing together @katherinetemplarlewis , Dr Diana Omigie, cognitive scientist at @goldsmithsuol , and @hinakoomori , London-based Japanese singer and composer, we ask - if sound can be felt as much as heard, how might we design sonic environments that heal, connect, or transform us?
Link in bio to listen - now available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts from 💡
Kinda Studios @ted 2026
We had the privilege of presenting Inspirit, our immersive audiovisual experience as part of the conference programming. Built from proven neuroscience on breath entrainment and immersive design, Inspirit asks guests to sync their breathing with the rhythm of the artwork to facilitate nervous system regulation.
Using neuroaesthetics design, we transformed the conference space into a sensory den using Dolby Atmos spatial audio, tactile cues, lighting and colour,where attendees could recharge and regulate across the week.
Conferences filled with intellectual stimulation and social exchange need moments of embodied states to balance our nervous systems. We can’t tackle global problems if we’re not feeling like our best, most resourced selves.
@robynlandau and @katherinetemplarlewis also hosted “Science You Can Feel”, an official TED discovery session on how to use neuroscience to design for social change. Through embodied and cognitive exercises, we explored how tapping into diverse ways of knowing can help us shape better futures.
Ideas Change Everything. How can we use neuroaesthetics to enhance our capacity for meaningful change?
Inspirit is available across hospitality, spa, museum and VOD spaces to transform how our bodies, minds and emotions can reset from our overstimulated world. Get in touch to learn more.
INSPIRIT PRODUCTION CREDITS
Visuals: @luhardcastle
Composition: @nailah.hunter
Spatial Sound Mix: @dannyyyyyyt
Production: @dotdotstudio
The transformative power of sound bonds us together as an emotional whole. It is a primordial technology of social connection that predates language. When we listen, move and feel sound collectively, something measurable happens in our bodies.
With over 150 music venues closing every year in the UK, we are dismantling the very spaces that bring us back into sync. These are the infrastructures that hold us together.
Sonic Infrastructures digs into the science, stories and foundations of how music binds us together in communities, and the powerful ways it spurs us into pro-social action for people and the planet. Read in full via the link in bio 🔗
The felt properties of sound have the potential to become powerful amplifiers of its effects, and emerging haptic technologies make these states accessible for a wider diversity of people.
Resonance, our one-day immersive sound event and rave in partnership with Westminster University and Deaf Rave found those who wore Woojer haptic vests reported heightened feelings of awe, wonder and joy.
Vibratory technologies help increase access to the felt states of music for more across individuals, making it a powerful tool to increase felt sensations of sound.
Read more in our Sonic Infrastructures report via the link in bio.
Our bodies are not passive vessels for listening. When our ears detect sound waves, the vibrations set off a chain reaction that resonates through our entire body.
This ability to sense our internal states is interoception, and it plays a key role in how we feel and understand our emotions.
As part of the Barbican’s Feel The Sound exhibition, our installation Your Inner Symphony collected over 25,000 data points of individuals’ unique physiological changes. Participants experienced a 5–7% reduction in heart rate across the sonic experience, displaying the unique potential of sonic experiences in supporting our wellbeing.
Read more details and results in our report via the link in bio.
Sound is interwoven into our cultural fabric - plugged into society across different dimensions.
From the rise of hi-fi systems and spaces for collective listening, to technological tools which optimise personal health. Rituals old and new, that see us dancing in our bedrooms, together in saunas and underground raves - the myriad ways we benefit from sonic infrastructures continues to grow.
@neurable_ EEG headphones to help focus, @devonojas listening rooms for audiophilic contemplation, getting lost in a sea of bodies at @fabriclondonofficial . We’re @brianeno -maxxing… which quadrant are you?
This matrix is part of “Sonic Infrastructures”, a new report published by Kinda Studios on sound and health. Read the full report now via the QR code or link in our bio.
In the past decade, scientific publications on “music and health” have tripled.
With this growing evidence base, we can now begin to understand which sounds and in which settings have the greatest impact on our physiology, mood, and wellbeing. It shows what artists and musicians have always known - that sound has the power to heal, and help us shape a better future for all.
The evidence speaks for itself - music and sound can grow beyond just cultural experience, and be embedded as powerful tools within healthcare systems with measurable benefits.
Read our full report now via the link in our bio.
Cover image: @soundhealgrow at Resonance at Westminster Uni
Today we launch “Sonic Infrastructures: Sounds & Spaces for Health”, an original report by Kinda Studios.
Synthesising emerging evidence from neuroscience, cultural and immersive industries, and Kinda Studios applied research, we ask, how can sound be established as a distinct domain for health to support our collective futures and wellbeing? What frameworks, systems and policies need to shift to integrate these into our communities?
Integrating empirical data with cultural movements, emerging design technologies and practice in accessibility and inclusion, we hope this report becomes a useful co-pilot for sonic products, experiences and environments that serve more than background or leisure, but a powerful force for physical, cognitive and emotional health.
Access the full report now via the link in our bio.
Report design by @cosmo.sofi
When we come together and move in synchrony, something measurable shifts: heart rates align, breathing patterns sync, and even neural activity begins to mirror across bodies. What feels mystical is happening at a biological level: we are wired for connection.
Cognitive anthropologist, Martha Newson’s work on raves and ritual culture shows that modern-day rituals are very much alive. From football stadiums to festivals and dance floors, ritual still surround every shared experience. Birth. Coming of age. Marriage. Death. We may modernise the setting, but the structure persists. Beneath the strobes or within ceremony, ritual is the social glue.
In our current fragmented world, connection is our collective power.
Opening image credit: @chironduong
Personal rituals shape how we move through everyday life.
When meaning is attached, ordinary actions become anchors to ground our emotions and even improve performance. Studies have shown up to 50% decrease in anxiety measures when a stressful task is followed by a ritual rather than simply resting, helping explain why these practices have endured across cultures and history, persisting into modern life.
@weare_loka was designed with this in mind, honouring and evolving the ritual of chai through seamless, sensory-led design. An intentional pause that engages the senses with ease, transforming chai into a moment of calm to remind us that order doesn’t remove uncertainty, but helps us move through it with greater ease.
Featured model — @nandidevi
Rituals can be found in every human society (and many non-human).
Across cultures and history, we return to rigid, repetitive, symbolic actions. Though they may seem senseless on the surface, rituals persist because they bring personal order and social glue to ease uncertainty. From the everyday ritualisation of tasks to complex, elaborate traditions, these behaviours have existed before language, giving rise to the foundation of what makes us meaningfully human—art, dance, music, and community.
Opening Image Credit:
Ghost Day, 2023 — @minhyunwoo_
