Barney - Ritisha Saxena- Week 16

 Has it ever caught your attention how you can forget where you put your phone five minutes ago, but you can somehow recall every lyric to a song you haven’t heard since second grade? This feeling goes beyond nostalgia! It's actually science! As children everything we learned came in a catchy tune, making the words more likely to stick!

An example of this that I hope we can all relate to is the ABCs.. you didn’t memorize the alphabet by staring at a list, you would sing it. In fact, try singing it without the tune, its harder right? That’s because melody can create a structure in each of our brains that helps lock in the information. This is also a reason commercials stay stuck in our heads and theme songs from before are so easy to remember. 

Songs have more value than just their repetition though, these songs are more than often tied to formative emotional experiences like road trips, holidays and specific teachers. Language that is linked to emotion activates many areas of your brain. So when you are hearing a song from your past, you're not just remembering the words you're in a way- re-experiencing the moment. 

Childhood songs become a mental time capsule. Upon re-singing them you are almost transported to the past. Recently, very randomly in fact I remember the Barney theme song which goes like “I love you, you love me, we are a big happy family with a kiss and hug from me to you won’t you say you love me to?” And upon remembering this, I also remembered those times at night when me and my parents would sing this song together and hug each other goodnight!