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You are reading a report and trying to concentrate. There was silence in the room. But despite your best efforts to focus, a small melody—the “Earworm”—still lingers in your head.
Research shows that most people Frequent earworms – this is more common in people who listen to music regularly music. A Finnish study found that more than 90% of people experience earworm infections at least weekly. About 60% of people experience these on a daily basis.
Why does your brain insist on playing snippets of tunes like “Jingle Bells,” “Bohemian Rhapsody” or “Golden Hits” when you’re trying to clear your head or at any time of day?
What about people with the following conditions? obsessive-compulsive disorder (obsessive-compulsive disorder) contrived?
What makes a song an earworm?
When you’ve listened to a song often or recently, it’s more likely to become an earworm.
In a 2015 study, we played an unfamiliar song to participants two to six times and then randomly contacted them over the next three days to ask if they song Trapped inside their heads.
About one-third of participants reported encountering earworms when exposed. We also found that earworms to the song were more common if participants listened to the song six times out of six sessions, and were most common on the following day.
What’s happening in our brains?
Research shows that brain function is broadly similar when people listen to music and experience musical imagery such as earworms. The word “imagery” here refers to the imaginative nature of the earworm—it’s not something we hear out loud, but inside our heads.
But a part of the brain called the auditory association cortex (which performs more complex brain tasks related to music listening) appears to play a greater role in musical imagery than the primary auditory cortex (which performs more basic tasks).
Another interesting finding involves people with congenital amusia, a condition that means they cannot listen to music as effectively as other people. This may mean that they are not good at discerning if something is out of tune and have difficulty remembering the melody they just heard.
researcher found that while their brains may not be as good at analyzing music, they still experienced earworms, albeit less frequently.
What do earworms have to do with memory?
When we experience earworms, what they seem to be doing is tapping into a part of our cognitive structure called work memory. We use working memory when we have to remember something someone else just told us, or when we do math in our heads.
Australian researchers found that if people had a song stuck in their heads while performing a task that tested working memory, they remembered things less accurately. Earworms are crowding out other information from working memory.
In another study, Australian researchers found that the more familiar people were with the songs, the more likely it was that the songs in their heads interfered with their working memory.
So what are earworms used for?
While the earworms we don’t like are certainly annoying and noticeable, research shows that most earworms are a relatively pleasant experience.
German researchers believe earworms are essentially a withdrawal reaction to not listening to music. Sometimes we want to listen to music but can’t, which could mean your withdrawal symptoms are earworms.
British researchers also found that the earworms people experience reflect the reasons they listen to music. So if people regularly listen to music to cheer them up, their earworms will usually be songs that cheer them up as well.
What is the experience of someone with OCD?
Earworms can sometimes cause problems for people with conditions such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), as they experience unwanted thoughts in their minds. Earworms might just be another unpopular idea.
However, research has been mixed on whether people with OCD experience more earworms than others because of their condition. Some research suggests that while people with OCD are more susceptible to earworms, they generally don’t experience them more frequently than other people.
Other studies did find that they encountered earworms more often. But people with OCD may simply be more aware of their earworms, and results like this could reflect that awareness.
Researchers suggest that the best treatment for people with OCD who are plagued by earworms is more extensive treatments such as exposure and reaction prevention. The goal is to reduce negative reaction patterns to intrusive thoughts.
How to get rid of unwanted earworms?
Some British researchers have found that chewing gum may be a way to get rid of unwanted earworms, as strange as that may sound.
This actually makes sense if the earworm revolves around our working memory – the part of our memory that’s held in our “inner voice” involves using the throat to “read silently”.
About the author
Timothy Byron is a lecturer in psychology at the University of Wollongong. This article is reproduced from dialogue Licensed under Creative Commons. read Original article.
So if you exercise your throat muscles by chewing gum, this may disrupt the circulation of earworms enough to put an end to them. Worth a try if your earworms bother you.
Or try listening to other music, as people tend not to get earworms when listening to other music. This allows you to get the song out of your head immediately – but then you’re likely to get caught up in all the other songs.
But there’s little evidence that listening to the entire song will get rid of earworms. Research shows that listening to the song increases the likelihood that the song will stick in your mind.