JAKARTA - Have you ever listened to one song and the song keeps echoing in your head? This phenomenon is actually called an earworm.
Earworm is a condition where the brain automatically repeats a piece of music due to activity in the auditory cortex, short-term memory, and emotions.
"(Earworm is) music that suddenly comes to your head without any deliberate effort to start it or prolong it," said a music cognition instructor, Susan Rogers, quoted from Huffpost, Thursday, December 18, 2025.
When you listen to music, many parts of the brain are active to help you analyze the sound and understand the emotions you feel in response to it.
However, there is one part of the brain, namely the auditory cortex that does the heavy work in processing songs and storing them as memories. This ultimately causes earworms, and the song continues to echo in your brain.
"Your auditory cortex will light up as if you were actually hearing the song in person, in full volume," says music therapy director Jenna Marcovitz.
In general, the song that keeps coming to your mind comes up when something in your surroundings triggers your memory. This may be something you read in a book, see on a billboard, or even a shadow.
In addition, the earworm phenomenon also usually occurs if you listen to a song that is often heard, has a catchy tone, or is related to emotional memories, and is generally not harmful although it sometimes interferes with concentration. The brain 'traps' the melody, playing it over and over again like an unfinished memory.
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