Ever had a catchy tune linger in your head for hours or sometimes days? Of course, you have. Earworms are common. Almost everyone has experienced them. Also known as song syndrome, sticky music, or the posh term, involuntary musical imagery, or INMI, they've been studied since 1885.
A study of US college students found that
- 97% had experienced an earworm in the past month
- One in five people had experienced an earworm more than once a day.
- The typical length was 10 to 30 minutes, though 8.5% said theirs lasted more than 3 hours.
- Level of distress caused was largely mild to moderate.
- 86% tried to stop an earworm by doing something distracting
"Very musical people may have more earworms because it's easy for them to conjure up a certain tune," says David Silbersweig, MD, chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and co-director of the Institute for the Neurosciences at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
Why it matters
Earworms are a feature of a healthy brain, harmless for the most part. In rare cases, however, earworms may be symptomatic of medical conditions like OCD.
Elaine Jones, MD, a neurologist and fellow of the American Academy of Neurology, advises taking earworms seriously if they're linked to "…loss of consciousness, confusion, visual loss or changes, speech arrest, tremors of arms or legs."
A closer look
- Music is processed in the area of the brain responsible for memory. When you hear a song, the auditory cortex creates a description of it and stores it in your short-term memory. When you listen to the song again, the auditory cortex activates the same neural networks, making the piece more likely to get stuck in your head.
- Cognitive itch. An earworm often associates a song with a specific situation or emotion, which makes the song more unforgettable, and more likely to get stuck in your head.
- Repetition. When you hear a song with a catchy melody or a repetitive chorus, it is easy for your brain to focus on that part of the song.
"A catchy tune or melody is the part of a song most likely to get stuck in a person's head, often a bit from the chorus," said Elizabeth H. Margulis, Ph.D., a professor at Princeton University and director of its Music Cognition Lab.
How to end an earworm
No guarantee, but the following methods have fans.
- Mix up your playlist.
- Take breaks. Longer duration listening is more likely to produce earworms.
- Walk to a different beat. Walk faster or slower than the beat of your earworm to interrupt the tempo of your earworm.
- Listen to the song all the way through. The brain has a tendency to remember fragments of music.
- Listen to a different song, one you don't like as much.
- Distract yourself. Try a movie, a book…something that requires concentration.
- Chew gum. Research-proven, chewing gum gets in the way of repetitive memories.
