Season 2 Episode 8: A Blast from the Past - Songs that Form the Soundtrack of our Teenage Dreams

<p><strong>Season 2</strong></p> <p><strong>Episode 8</strong></p> <p><strong>A BLAST FROM THE PAST – Songs that Form the Soundtrack of our Teenage Dreams</strong></p> <p>Why do the songs we heard as a teenager sound sweeter than anything we have ever listened to as an adult? In recent years, psychologists and neuroscientists have done plenty of research and have confirmed that these oldies but goodies hold disproportionate power over our emotions. And researchers have uncovered evidence that suggests our brains bind us to the music that we heard as teenagers more tightly than anything we’ll ever hear as adults—a connection that doesn’t weaken whatsoever as we age. Musical nostalgia, in other words, isn’t just a cultural phenomenon: It’s a neutronic command. And no matter how sophisticated our tastes might otherwise grow to be, our brains may stay jammed on those songs we obsessed over during the high drama during the years of our adolescence.</p> <p>But memories are meaningless without emotion—and aside from love and drugs, nothing spurs an emotional reaction like music. Many research studies show that our favorite songs stimulate our brain’s pleasure circuit, which releases an influx of dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and other neurochemicals that make us feel good. A lot of big words, right! The more we like a song, the more we get treated to neurochemical bliss, flooding our brains.</p> <p>Music lights these sparks of neutronic activity in everyone. But when we were young, the sparks turned into a fireworks show. Between the ages of 10 and 22, our brains undergo rapid neurological development—and the music we love during that decade seems to get wired into our lobes for the rest of our lives. When we make neural connections to a song, we also create a strong memory trace that becomes overloaded with heightened emotion, thanks partly to a surplus of youthful growth hormones. These hormones tell our brains that <em><strong>everything </strong></em>is incredibly important—especially the songs that form the soundt