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Have you ever been waiting in line at the grocery store,
你是否曾經在雜貨店里排隊等候，
innocently perusing the magazine rack, when a song pops into your head?
毫無念頭的瀏覽著雜志書架時，有一首歌在你的腦海里響起？
Not the whole song, but a fragment of it that plays and replays
不是整首歌，而是部分片段一遍接著一遍回響在耳邊，與拍子分秒不差的契合，
until you find yourself unloading the vegetables in time to the beat.
直到你發現到自己將蔬菜取出來結帳。
You've been struck by an earworm, and you're not alone.
你已經受擾于耳朵蟲，而且你不是一個人。
Over 90% of people are plagued by earworms at least once a week,
超過90%的人每個禮拜至少有一次會受到耳朵蟲的侵擾，
and about a quarter of people experience them several times a day.
而大概有四分之一的人每天會經歷好幾遍。
They tend to burrow in during tasks that don't require much attention,
他們會在工作不是太需要注意力時沈浸其中，
say, when waiting on water to boil or a traffic light to change.
比如在等待水煮開的時候或是等待交通信號燈轉換時。
This phenomenon is one of the mind's great mysteries.
此現象是人類腦袋里最神秘的事情。
Scientists don't know exactly why it's so easy for tunes to get stuck in our heads.
科學家們也不清楚曲調會如此輕易地深植于我們腦海里的原因。
From a psychological perspective, earworms are an example of mental imagery.
從心理學角度來看，耳朵蟲是心理的假想。
This imagery can be visual, like when you close your eyes and imagine a red wagon, or it can be auditory,
這種假想可以是視覺性的，就像當你閉上眼睛想像一輛紅色的貨車；或者也可能是聲樂性的假想，
like when you imagine the sound of a baby screaming, or oil sizzling in a pan.
就像當你在想像著嬰兒哭泣的聲音，或是像平底鍋里油吱吱做響的聲音。
Earworms are a special form of auditory imagery because they're involuntary.
耳朵蟲是特殊的聲樂性假想，因為這些音樂會不由自主地回響起。
You don't plug your ears and try to imagine "Who Let the Dogs Out," or, well, you probably don't.
你不必堵住耳朵然后試圖想像「是誰放出狗的？」這首歌，或者，你大概什么也不需要做。
It just intrudes onto your mental soundscape and hangs around like an unwanted house guest.
它恰恰可以侵入進你內心的聲樂天地，而且就像個不請自來的客人在你的腦中到處晃蕩。
Earworms tend to be quite vivid and they're normally made up of a tune, rather than, say, harmonies.
耳朵蟲是相當鮮明的，一般來說它們由旋律組成，而不是合聲。
A remarkable feature of earworms is their tendency to get stuck in a loop,
耳朵蟲的奇特之處在于它像陷在繞圈圈般不斷重復的傾向，
repeating again and again for minutes or hours.
不斷重復播放長達數分鐘或數小時之久。
