Even the most wonderful song, if it spins endlessly in the head, can eventually drive anyone crazy. Fortunately, scientists have found a way to get rid of obsessive motives.
An obsessive melody, from which sometimes it is not possible to get rid of for hours, or even days, the problem seems to be not so important that great scientists spend their energy on it. However, given how often melodies get stuck in a person’s head, a real investigation was carried out. First, James J. Kellaris of the University of Cincinnati proved that 99% of people face this problem from time to time. And scientists from the University of Reading (UK) suggested that the best way to get rid of the attached melody is by no means reading, solving crossword puzzles or other ways to switch attention. Save us can … chewing gum!
The part of the brain responsible for auditory information (the auditory cortex) is activated when we hear music, and as soon as we hear a fragment of a familiar tune again, the brain begins to play it again and again. According to study leader Philip Beaman, this may be some form of involuntary musical memory. Since the process of chewing is somewhat similar to subvocalization (silent speech), which can suppress short-term memory and sound images in the head, it was decided to test the chewing gum.
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- Oliver Sachs: “Man is musical”
Three separate experiments were conducted, during which the participants played “clinging” melodies. At the same time, some participants chewed gum, while others did not. The first experiment assessed the effect of chewing on the conscious occurrence of musical images, as well as their reappearance after the participants tried to get rid of the melody sounding in their heads. The participants were played popular music and in the first stage they were asked not to think about it, and in the second stage no restrictions were placed. As the researchers expected, the mental repetition of melodies decreased in both cases.
The second experiment, devoted directly to the “internal listening” of music, showed that chewing gum suppresses this ability. Finally, the third experiment was designed to test whether any motor activity has the same effect, or only those where the speech muscles are involved. The participants were divided into two groups: one was instructed to chew gum, the other to tap out the rhythm of a new melody with their fingers. Chewing proved to be more effective.
Подробнее см. Philip Beaman, Kitty Powell, Ellie Rapley «Want to block earworms from conscious awareness? B(u)y gum!», The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 2015.