Fingernails on a Chalkboard and Other Sounds That Make Us Cringe

Soon silence will have passed into legend. Man has turned his back on silence. Day after day he invents machines and devices that increase noise and distract humanity from the essence of life, contemplation, meditation.
~Jean Arp

When fingernails scratch on the chalkboard, the pitch frequency of the sound is between 2000 and 4000 hertz. The human ear is most sensitive to this frequency because of the anatomy of the ear canal.

A study revealed that the physical reaction many of us feel when we hear the nails on chalkboard sound has learned elements to it as well. See the study overview here. I did listen to the audio file on the linked page, and I have to say that the recorded fingernails on the chalkboard did not bother me nearly as much as the image of nails on a chalkboard.

There are various sounds that set people's teeth on edge. It seems to be an individual sort of thing. There are certain sounds that drive me to distraction (and sometimes the edge of sanity!). Nearly everyone I know can't stand fingernails on a chalkboard. I cannot find an explanation as to why some people cannot stand the sound of styrofoam, a fork scraping across a plate - or my own personal sound aversion: certain types of fabric or material that have a smooth/highly grooved surface when scratched make me shudder.

I was unable to find a definitive answer. Maybe everyone suffers a little from misophonia - a form of decreased sound tolerance.

Note: It seems like sound aversions could be related as much to texture as sound.

Something else I learned: it may actually be mid-range frequencies that are the worst for people to hear.