How to get that song - exactly that one - out of your head

Have you ever had a song, jingle, or catchy tune stuck in your head for days or even weeks? According to a study by Plos One, the earworm worms its way into our minds and affects about 90% of people at least once a week, lingering for 15–30 seconds. In particular, James Kellaris, a marketing professor at the University of Cincinnati, found that this intrusive sensation is more likely to affect women, who also tend to find it more irritating.

What are the traits of an earworm, and why does it happen?

Fast-paced musical passages, familiar melodies, unusual intervals with jumps or repetitions, and lingering notes that stick with us: these are the perfect ingredients to turn the latest Spotify Daily Mix hit into a persistent earworm. "Some people constantly have music playing in their heads," says Ira Hyman, a psychologist researching this phenomenon at Western Washington University. Neurologically, earworms seem to activate the brain's left primary auditory cortex, the area connected to hearing. Additionally, if a song has emotional significance to us, it is even more likely to stick.

The two main players in processing auditory information are the amygdala (part of the limbic system that handles emotions) and the hippocampus, which is involved in memory processing. Adding to this repetitive fixation is the dopamine release triggered by listening to a song that moves us emotionally. According to Dr. Hyman, these songs tend to surface during moments of relaxation, causing what’s known as "stuck song syndrome." Activities like walking, doing puzzles, or washing dishes create extra mental space, allowing our minds to wander, as confirmed by a study on university students.

How can you get a song out of your head?

"Typically, it's fragments of a song that stick, not the whole piece," explains Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis, head of the Music Cognition Lab at Princeton University. Similar to advice about moving on from a breakup, the "fight fire with fire" method might work: listening to a different song can help dislodge the persistent melody. Dr. Waters advocates for repetition: in a TikTok video, she suggests that listening to the full song or jingle multiple times could resolve its unfinished harmonic tension, allowing the loop to "unlock." Specifically, some experts argue that when the brain can't recall the end of a song, it "rewinds" to the part it knows, causing the repetition. Listening to the song in its entirety could complete the process and provide relief.

A 2015 study by the University of Reading suggests that chewing gum may be one of the best methods for silencing an earworm. Researchers played a song for 18 university students and then asked them not to think about it for three minutes. Half of the participants were given gum during that time, while the others were not. The action of chewing appears to engage areas of the brain involved in processing auditory information, as confirmed by Emery Schubert, a psychologist at the University of New South Wales. Another solution? Engage in conversation with someone you don’t know well, as the social effort shifts your attention.

Can earworms work to our advantage?

According to some studies, earworms can be leveraged for learning, such as memorizing to-do lists by replacing song lyrics with what you need to remember. This way, what gets stuck in your head serves a purpose. Indeed, when words or short phrases are paired with a melody, they are easier to retain. So why not use this natural tendency to your advantage and learn a new language?