V.J. Williamson
Sticky tunes: How do people react to involuntary musical imagery?
Williamson, V.J.; Liikkanen, L.A.; Jakubowski, Kelly; Stewart, L.
Authors
Abstract
The vast majority of people experience involuntary musical imagery (INMI) or ‘earworms’; perceptions of spontaneous, repetitive musical sound in the absence of an external source. The majority of INMI episodes are not bothersome, while some cause disruption ranging from distraction to anxiety and distress. To date, little is known about how the majority of people react to INMI, in particular whether evaluation of the experience impacts on chosen response behaviours or if attempts at controlling INMI are successful or not. The present study classified 1046 reports of how people react to INMI episodes. Two laboratories in Finland and the UK conducted an identical qualitative analysis protocol on reports of INMI reactions and derived visual descriptive models of the outcomes using grounded theory techniques. Combined analysis carried out across the two studies confirmed that many INMI episodes were considered neutral or pleasant, with passive acceptance and enjoyment being among the most popular response behaviours. A significant number of people, however, reported on attempts to cope with unwanted INMI. The most popular and effective behaviours in response to INMI were seeking out the tune in question, and musical or verbal distraction. The outcomes of this study contribute to our understanding of the aetiology of INMI, in particular within the framework of memory theory, and present testable hypotheses for future research on successful INMI coping strategies.
Citation
Williamson, V., Liikkanen, L., Jakubowski, K., & Stewart, L. (2014). Sticky tunes: How do people react to involuntary musical imagery?. PLoS ONE, 9(1), Article e86170. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0086170
Journal Article Type | Article |
---|---|
Acceptance Date | Dec 6, 2013 |
Online Publication Date | Jan 31, 2014 |
Publication Date | Jan 31, 2014 |
Deposit Date | May 23, 2016 |
Publicly Available Date | Jun 21, 2016 |
Journal | PLoS ONE |
Publisher | Public Library of Science |
Peer Reviewed | Peer Reviewed |
Volume | 9 |
Issue | 1 |
Article Number | e86170 |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0086170 |
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Copyright Statement
Copyright: © 2014 Williamson et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
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