![]() “It was quite surprising to me how many reports we had of music evoking memories of ex-partners like ex-girlfriends or ex-boyfriends.” “Because music is coupled to these very emotional events, it can be a really effective cue to bring back the strong emotions that we felt at the moment when the event initially happened,” Jakubowski said. In the UK, this song is often associated with Princess Diana because Elton John performed it at her funeral. One example is “Candle in the Wind,” which participants in Jakubowski’s ongoing work have namechecked repeatedly. Specific sad songs seem to cue autobiographical memories for a large number of people. However, early results of the research show an interesting pattern, Jakubowski said. If your daily commute is tuned to the Top 40, then your music-evoked memories get triggered by Gaga, Ariana Grande and Kacey Musgraves. If you like violins and opera, then your autobiographical soundtrack centers around classical music. So far, “it’s hard to say” whether genres are specifically associated with autobiographical memories, Jakubowski said, because this type of memory tends to be linked to whatever music you engage with on a daily basis. (You can take part and contribute your musical memories here). ![]() Since that study, Jakubowski’s lab has begun probing whether earworms shape our autobiographical memories - and how. “Lady Gaga’s ‘Bad Romance’ was the top named earworm in that survey.”Įarworms also tended to feature generic or predictable melodic contours - simplistic, up-and-down melodies, the kind sometimes heard in children’s songs like “Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star.” “People were more likely to get upbeat, fast tempo songs in their head than slower songs,” Jakubowski said. Her team analyzed these reviews to expose which musical features were most commonly found in infectious tunes. Three years ago, Jakubowski’s lab released one of the largest studies on earworms - wherein 3,000 people reviewed 3,800 mainstream songs, which included pop, rock, rap, rhythm and blues and so on. “Both are everyday experiences, and both are involuntary memory processes,” Jakubowski said. Kelly Jakubowski, a music psychologist at Durham University in England, has studied what makes an earworm, and says these catchy tunes share much in common with music-evoked autobiographical memories. And while these four tracks may seem eclectic, one thing unites them: They’re earworms - songs that easily get stuck in your head. “Sk8er Boi” by Avril Lavigne.Īll of these songs came up in conversation when I asked people to name the music that always reminds them of their exes (Feel free to respond on Twitter or in this story’s comments, and I’ll add your songs). “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” by Taylor Swift. Do certain genres lend themselves to becoming stuck in your head? ![]() This Valentine’s Day, when our minds are already filled with thoughts of love old and new, the PBS NewsHour asked three neuroscientists about why music-evoked memories are so potent - and whether we can let them go. This nostalgia can be wonderful if these erstwhile moments are worth cherishing, but what if you’re ready to ::clears throat:: move on? What if you want to drop these songs into a playlist without worrying about your exes spontaneously flashing in your brain? Studies have shown, for instance, that people with Alzheimer’s disease can often keep playing instruments or humming their favorite childhood tunes while other recollections fade away. These music-evoked memories can stay intact, even as critical memory centers in the brain degrade. That’s why when you hear your wedding song, the flavors of your cake or the sights of your uncle’s epic dance moves come flooding back into your mind. By leaving traces in various nooks of the mind, songs strengthen the details in our memories - what we smelled, what we saw, how we felt. In the last couple of decades, research has increasingly shown that listening to music can stimulate more parts of the brain than any other human activity. A song looping in your mind is like a rehearsal - it doesn’t only improve your memory of the music itself, but all the memories that you’ve connected with that song.
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