The neurophysiology of auditory hallucinations – a historical and contemporary review

• ¹ Department of Psychiatry, University Medical Center, Utrecht, Netherlands
• ² Rudolph Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, Utrecht, Netherlands
• ³ Department of Psychiatry, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA

Electroencephalography and magnetoencephalography are two techniques that distinguish themselves from other neuroimaging methodologies through their ability to directly measure brain-related activity and their high temporal resolution. A large body of research has applied these techniques to study auditory hallucinations. Across a variety of approaches, the left superior temporal cortex is consistently reported to be involved in this symptom. Moreover, there is increasing evidence that a failure in corollary discharge, i.e., a neural signal originating in frontal speech areas that indicates to sensory areas that forthcoming thought is self-generated, may underlie the experience of auditory hallucinations.