When people are trying hard to listen to something, the body seems to do its best to "prick up its ears," even though this ability was lost by our evolutionary ancestors millions of years ago. That's ...

When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The muscles that enable modern humans to wiggle their ears likely had a more important job in our ...

If you hear something interesting, you might prick up your ears. That's a figurative expression, of course. People's ears don't actually move upward. But NPR's Nell Greenfieldboyce found that this old ...

Humans actually have vestigial muscles that activate when listening closely to something, even though people lost the ability to really move their... Your ears can't prick up, but your ear muscles ...

In almost every species, ear movement can be a clue that the animal is trying to pay close attention to something. When people are trying hard to listen to something, the body seems to do its best to ...