About one in five people can wiggle their ears—while the rest watch in non-wiggly envy. But what makes this skill possible for some and impossible for others? Ear movement is controlled by the ...

Francesca has an MSci in Biochemistry from the University of Birmingham.View full profile Francesca has an MSci in Biochemistry from the University of Birmingham. Thought to be pretty redundant in ...

Tens of millions of years ago, our primate ancestors responded to noises in much the same way many other mammals do, pricking their ears and deftly turning them towards the sound's source. While a few ...

Evolution has largely deprived us of our ability to swivel our ears, but those vestigial muscles still activate when we listen intently, according to new research. Reading time 3 minutes Tens of ...

The little muscles that enable people to wiggle their ears unconsciously flex when we're trying to pick one sound out of a din of noise, a new study finds. Think about how cats, dogs and certain ...

If you can wiggle your ears, you can use muscles that helped our distant ancestors listen closely. These auricular muscles helped change the shape of the pinna, or the shell of the ear, funneling ...

A “useless” muscle that allows some people to wiggle their ears actually activates when we strain to hear something. Our ape ancestors lost the ability to pivot their ears when they diverged from ...