After Dance Monkey by Australian singer-songwriter Tones and I topped a music chart recently, its lyric got stuck inside the head of many listeners. Oh, I see you, see you, see you every time. And oh my, I, I like your style. People can sing this, all day, all night.
This condition is called earworms, also known as sticky music or stuck-song syndrome, which happened among Thais earlier this year when many people were reportedly unable to stop hearing in their heads the Chip 'N' Dale chirp from the Thai-themed animated short Our Floating Dreams. Back then, the Department of Mental Health went so far as to issue tips for those who had this song stuck in their head.
Digital music service Spotify noticed the repeat behaviour of listeners and a couple months ago decided to launch what they call On Repeat & Repeat Rewind playlists for each user, based on their listening habits. To find out more about how catchy songs or earworms take their toll on people and how to get rid of them, Life interviewed Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis, director of the Music Cognition Lab at Princeton University in the US. Margulis' research approaches music from the combined perspectives of music theory and cognitive science. Her book On Repeat: How Music Plays The Mind received the 2014 Wallace Berry Award from the Society for Music Theory, and the 2015 Ascap Deems Taylor/Virgil Thomson Award. Her latest book, The Psychology Of Music: A Very Short Introduction, was released last year.
Director of the Music Cognition Lab at Princeton University, Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis. (Photo: http://www.elizabethmargulis.com)
Why were you interested in earworms?
Earworms are a startlingly common example of a kind of hallucinatory experience -- without even trying, people hear things that aren't there. These kinds of cognitive quirks often have a lot to tell us about how the brain works.
What are the characteristics of most earworms?
Earworms tend to be short snippets of a tune that was heard recently and often. They typically loop as if stuck on repeat.
Are earworms in other languages similar to English-language earworms?
Earworms have cropped up as common phenomena in all the places and languages they've been studied so far.
Why do some situations, such as waiting, driving or being alone, make songs stick in our heads more than usual?
Earworms tend to occur more frequently when people are in low-attention states. It could be that earworms also exist just below consciousness in other kinds of situations, but we're too busy doing other things to notice them. Or it could be that earworms truly develop more readily when the brain is in this kind of state.
(Photo: https://newsroom.spotify.com)
Why are some earworms enjoyable, but some annoying?
Since earworms are by definition involuntary, we're really at the mercy of what gets stuck. If it's from a song that makes us feel great, an earworm might be OK, but if it's from some horrible commercial jingle, it might feel extremely intrusive.
Can earworms be harmful or have effects on mental illnesses?
Most people experience earworms fairly regularly. They are absolutely normal. In some exceptional cases, however, people can experience more serious, chronic kinds of earworms that can interfere with daily functioning. This is quite rare, however.
Does susceptibility to earworms have any connection to a person's level of creativity?
People are hard at work now studying how individual differences in susceptibility to earworms might correlate with other personal characteristics.
What is your favourite earworm at the moment?
My whole family often has earworms from Vulfpeck's Birds Of A Feather, We Rock Together, sometimes even at the same time!
(Photo: http://www.elizabethmargulis.com)
What's the best method to get rid of earworms?
Studies show that chewing gum can dislodge earworms. Other suggestions include throwing yourself into a task with a high attentional load, or listening to a different song.
What is your advice for executives at music labels who want to create successful earworms?
Earworms typically possess a familiar enough structure that they're easy to remember, but also some kind of hook or idiosyncratic feature that prevents them from being generic.
