🎶 Press play... What it means to listen to the same song over and over again, according to psychology 👀

Music releases dopamine in the brain and generates a feeling of pleasure.

Repeating a song over and over is common, experts point out. According to the journal Psicología y Mente, when we listen to music we like, the brain releases dopamine, generating a feeling of pleasure and reward in the body, something that can cause us to repeat our favorite song on repeat. What's more, when it's our favorite song, the default mode network (DMON) is activated in the brain, responsible for much of the brain activity that occurs when the mind is at rest and allows for self-reflection and mind wandering.

This behavior may also be due to the nostalgia the piece generates, according to the specialized journal. Music can activate the hippocampus and make some distant memories more accessible.

Although in most cases, listening to a song on repeat is harmless, this practice is sometimes linked to anxiety disorders. According to psychologist Patricia Morales on the Doctoralia website, "anxious/nervous people are more likely to repeat the song on repeat. From a psychological perspective, it could be treated similarly to obsessive thoughts that replay in the mind."

Psychologist María Angelica Barrero Guinand expresses a similar opinion, suggesting that these songs can be an "anxiety avoidance measure." "Songs can function as 'empty content' to block out intrusive thoughts," she says, while also pointing out that "music can be a wonderful relaxation tool if you use it for what it is: music, listening to it carefully and enjoying it (not as a distraction)."

In other cases, it's the music itself that's created to be catchy and loop in the brain. Simple melodies and easy-to-understand lyrics are often characteristic of these songs, according to composer Laura Taylor. This advertising and video game music specialist stated in an interview with the Huffington Post that there are tricks in song design to make them catchy, such as "keeping the instrumentation sparse during the verses" and, during the chorus, adding more instruments.

This creates the annoying earworm. More technically known as Involuntary Musical Imagery (IMNI), this phenomenon refers to the experience in which a song or melody gets stuck in a person's mind and plays repeatedly involuntarily. "This strange mental phenomenon demonstrates how little conscious control we have over our brains and what goes on in our heads," clinical psychologist David J. Ley writes in Psychology Today.

Source: infobae

And for you, what was the last song you played on repeat?

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