It's well past midnight, you've laid your head on the pillow, ready to enjoy the silence. But what's that? In the background of your mind, that simple, meaningless commercial jingle you probably heard at the grocery store this morning starts playing. You try to stop it, but it's futile; the chorus loops back, again and again.

Derived from the German word "Ohrwurm" and known in English as "Earworm," this phenomenon is basically like a "cognitive itch" for our brain. Scientists call it "Involuntary Musical Imagery," but we can simply call it "mental torture."

The interesting thing is that the songs that get stuck in our heads are rarely musical masterpieces or complex symphonies. Usually, melodies that are simple, repetitive, and have a strong rhythmic structure do the job better. It is no coincidence that Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" or Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out of My Head" (which literally summarizes the situation) are so frequently cited as "earworms" on charts.

So why does our brain do this to us? Part of the culprit might be the "Zeigarnik Effect." According to this psychological theory, our brain is more inclined to remember uncompleted tasks than completed ones. If you only know the chorus of a song and can't remember the rest, your brain keeps looping that chorus to complete the missing piece. It's like a stuck record, an equation that can't reach a solution.

This usually triggers when our mind is idle; while walking, washing dishes, or taking a shower. During low-attention tasks, the brain goes into "screensaver" mode and usually starts playing the most recent or simplest data it has.

The ways to get rid of this musical intruder are just as strange as the situation itself. Some research suggests that chewing gum works. Yes, you heard that right. Jaw movements can confuse the parts of the brain related to musical memory and break that loop.

Another method is to surrender: Listen to the song from beginning to end, in its entirety. Give the brain the message "Look, the song is over, task completed" to end the Zeigarnik effect. Sometimes, humming another song called a "cure song" (something slow and heavy like the British National Anthem) can disrupt that fast loop.

Still, sometimes it's best to make peace with that song. Maybe your brain just wants to have some fun, or it's trying to cope with stress by holding onto that melody. After all, you have a free radio inside your head, and while the DJ's taste in music is sometimes terrible, at least they never leave you alone.