20 September 2026

Writen by: Natalia Editing: Murzta Published by: Saffron

The Never-Ending Chorus

Why can't you get a song out of your head?

It comes when you least expect it, a pleasant tune in your head and you sing along. It’s fun, it’s lively. Give it a couple minutes and the rhythm shows no sign of stopping. It’s playing round and round on loop in your head, alas, the earworm is awoken!

Involuntary musical imagery, stuck song syndrome or more commonly known as an earworm, is the spontaneous and repetitive experience of a tune playing in your head without any deliberate effort to recall it. (Your Brain on Music: Earworms) Coming from the German “Ohrwurm”, it’s a special form of involuntary musical imagery out of our control which can become quite unpleasant and irritating, especially if it’s a song which is generally unliked.

The kinds of songs which get stuck in people’s heads depend entirely on the person. Songs that trigger some kind of emotional charge, whether deliberately or unknowingly, or songs associated with a particular memory are more likely to stick. It can also depend on the longer duration of certain notes and if intervals between the notes are smaller. (Harvard scientist on why that song is stuck in your head) 

Earworms are related to memory since auditory information functions as a strong mnemonic. Psychologically, earworms are a ‘cognitive itch’: the brain automatically itches back, resulting in a vicious loop. The more one tries to suppress the songs, the more their impetus increases, a mental process known as ironic process theory. (Stuck song syndrome: musical obsessions — when to look for OCD - PMC) The brain can reactivate the neural patterns associated with hearing music, essentially allowing us to “replay” a song internally.

Interestingly, earworms aren't necessarily just an annoying glitch. Involuntary musical imagery may be a normal consequence of how efficiently the brain processes and remembers music. Researchers found that earworms can improve memory of events associated with music. (Why It Could Be Good to Have a Song Stuck in Your Head | Psychology Today) 

A study conducted in 2021 found that people remembered more details from the movies the more they experienced earworms for the music that accompanied these films when presented music in conjunction with unfamiliar movies. This suggests that earworms may help us to remember not only new music, but also events coupled to that music, for example,  autobiographical memories from our lives.

Ultimately, there is more to an earworm than just being an annoying loop stuck in a person’s head. It has shown to be useful in memory processing for both the song and the events associated with it as songs have proven to hold some sort of emotional significance. So the next time you catch yourself humming a song for longer than usual, you know now that you are solidifying a memory for life.