The auricular muscles, which enabled our distant ancestors to move their ears for better hearing, activate when people try to ...

Vestigial ear muscles activate during focused listening, revealing a hidden link to our auditory past and evolution.

To test whether humans still use auricular muscles — which once helped move our primate ancestors’ ears to funnel sound — scientists attached electrodes to the sides of people’s heads, and asked them ...

They explained that the muscles helped change the shape of the pinna, or the shell of the ear, funneling sound to the eardrums. Millions of years ago, our ancestors stopped using them, so humans’ ...

A preauricular pit is a small hole in front of your ear that you are born with. Most of the time it is harmless and doesn’t cause any health problems. A preauricular pit is a small hole or cyst ...

Summary: Humans have vestigial ear muscles that once helped our ancestors focus on sounds. New research shows these muscles still activate when we strain to hear in noisy environments. Scientists used ...