Thousands, possibly millions of people are affected everyday. Work is interrupted, loving exchanges are disrupted, and individuals think they're losing their minds. What devious condition is to blame?

Earworms.

Before you gross out, don't worry, the term is metaphorical. Earworms are those songs or snippets of music that get stuck in your head, the ones that repeat over and over and over and over and... Thankfully, the Music, Mind and Brain Group at the University of London's Goldsmiths College is taking on the challenge of finding out how these lil' worms function.

We interviewed lead scientist Dr. Victoria Williamson, a.k.a. Vicky, about this mental phenomenon. (Written Brit "accent" left intact for your reading pleasure.)

How were you inspired to start this unique project?

The inspiration for this project came from both Dr. Lauren Stewart and me. We had, completely independently, begun to read up on musical imagery in our spare time. For myself, I was interested in the phenomenon of earworms because I get them all the time and I wanted to know how common the experience was for other people. Dr. Stewart then came across Shaun Keaveny's breakfast show on 6Music, where the team run an 'earworm feature;' people can text in to tell Shaun about the earworms they are hearing.

In discussion Dr. Stewart and I decided there was the potential for an interesting research project in collaboration with the BBC, so we got in touch with 6Music and they loved the idea. We were then awarded a research grant by the British academy. And that was how it all started. We now have a team of 7 at Goldsmiths who are working on different aspects of the project: myself and my grant collaborator Dr. Daniel Mullensiefen, Dr. Stewart, our two masters students Josh Fry and Sebastian Finkel, our research collaborator Rhinannon Jones, and our research assistant Sagar Jilka.

You say that women get earworms more than men, and musicians and hardcore music fans get them more than others. What other types of details might your online survey show you? Will you follow up with controlled lab studies?

Our research project will look at links between earworm experiences and the demographic factors of gender, age, and music listening habits. Building upon these more basic associations we will also look at different aspects of 'musical experience,' such as performing skills, training, singing ability, and the prevalence and nature of other types of musical imagery.

We are also looking at different aspects of personality that might be associated with earworm experiences. Once we have established more information about the nature and prevalence of earworms we do intend to plan some controlled studies where we can look into the experience of earworms more closely. But before doing so I believe it is really important to determine how this phenomenon occurs in everyday life, and that is the point of the questionnaire.



Do you have any secret hopes about where earworm research might lead you?

The earworm research has great potential as it is such a common phenomenon. One Finnish study suggested over 90% of people get them once a week so the insights we will gain will have something to say for nearly everyone.

In a larger sense I think earworms are a really interesting clue to at least two aspects of how our brains work, aside from the general interest in why we are so attracted to musical sounds.

First, the workings of the inner musical world. So much of musical inspiration and understanding comes from a level of processing that we cannot reliably gain conscious access to, just as we often are not able to control earworms. Understanding more about why earworms get stuck in our heads and why they are triggered will tell us more about the nature of how our brains process music 'behind the curtain.'

Second, our research could also have the potential to provide insights into the nature of intrusive cognitions, since earworms are not always a welcome occurrence. It may be that we can learn to control them, but that requires us to better understand them first.

What areas of science and technology interest you the most, both areas that you work in and ones you follow for your own reasons?

My interest as a scientist is in exploring the nature of our musical minds. I am keen to understand why so many people from all known human societies are drawn to music. Also, how learning music influences the way our brains develop and how musical therapies can positively influence our state of being. I am interested in the entire spectrum of music psychology investigation, from auditory psychophysical investigation of the sound itself right up to investigations of cerebral emotions and conscious states. This is one of the best things about my discipline; music is intricately woven into so many of our brain processes that there is a chance to learn more about all of them by looking at responses to music.

I have a general interest in cognitive psychology and while I am very interested in neuroscience findings and techniques, I am more drawn in my own work to what might be thought of as 'old school' psychology--I like the simplicity and elegance of a clear hypothesis, a well controlled experiment, and a well constructed narrative explanation of the findings. I suspect in this regard I have been strongly influenced by my PhD supervisors, Professors Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch.

Can you tell us a little about your background as a scientist?

I wanted to be a psychology researcher from the day of my first psychology lesson at sixteen. I loved science as a process and way of thinking, and was captivated by the idea of applying scientific methods to the study of human behaviour. So I completed a first class degree in Psychology at the University of York.

Upon finishing I decided to specialise in music psychology, because this allowed me to bring my passion for music into my job. I have played Spanish guitar since the age of six and I have taught the instrument since I was fifteen. So I completed a Masters degree in the Psychology of Music at Sheffield University and then I applied for a PhD to study the nature of musical memory. I developed new musical memory tests throughout the course of my PhD and when I had completed my thesis I applied for a grant to allow me to examine musical memory in a population of individuals who were born 'tone deaf' (congenital amusia).



I moved to the Music, Mind and Brain group at Goldsmiths to begin this work with Dr. Lauren Stewart, an expert in the field. At present I am on my second contract within Dr. Stewart's group, working on exploring various cognitive abilities in musical individuals, as a way to not only learn more about the condition for the benefit of the individuals concerned, but also to learn more about the nature of the musical brain.

Tell us about your own "earworms" (or as some of us call them, brainworms). Any particular favorites, or most despised songs and snippets, that you get stuck in your head?

I have a deep love of music and I am therefore, a very regular listener. From a very young age I have had a small collection of regular earworm visitors, all of which I mostly enjoy hearing (depending on circumstances--I recall being particularly annoyed if they happened during exams!). 'Sitting on the Dock of the Bay' by Otis Redding is one and 'Mr. Tambourine Man' as sung by the Byrds is another. On the more classical side I hear a lot of Spanish guitar music generally, and often hear Panis Angelicus, despite the fact that I still do not know most of the correct words!

I am also interested in earworms that we can't recognise, so it is quite possible that they are new compositions. These are rarer, but they do happen and they happen to me. These types of earworms might give us an interesting insight into the creative musical processes, although their rarity makes that kind of study potentially quite difficult.

Do you also study phenomena related to what I think of as 'spontaneous composition?' In other words, the brain actually invents new music and plays it for you, rather than recycling snippets of "More Than a Feeling" over and over...

Good question. The Finnish survey suggests that about 20% of what people think of as 'earworms' would fall into this category, that being 'new' pieces of music, or at least things the participants don't recognise as memories. We may only think of these earworm tunes as 'new' because people report not being able to recognise them. It may be that people have actually heard the music before but it just didn't register in memory.

Basically to differentiate standard musical imagery from an earworm we are using the following definition. An earworm is typically a short section of musical imagery that is stuck on repeat and which therefore you have a limited degree of control over. If your spontaneous composition imagery experience falls into this category then, for the purposes of our research, we would classify that as an earworm experience. I get these. Little phrases, often in guitar music (including sometimes with orchestration), that get stuck in my head. Ironically I am no good at playing by ear, I am a sight reader, so they tend to remain in my head too.


Tell Vicky about your own earworms at the MMB data collection point. Learn more at Music, Mind and Brain.




Tip of the sheriff's hat to Jane H. for the lead.