Good music makes pretty much all of us feel good, but for around half the population, it can actually produce chills, sometimes known as "skin orgasms," Quartz reports. These people are a bit different from those who have a less intense response to their favorite songs, according to a recent study published in Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.
Scientists took brain scans of 10 people who said they got chills while listening to music and 10 who didn't. The people who got chills had more fibers connecting their auditory cortex (which we use to process what we hear), the brain areas that process emotions, and the prefrontal cortex (which we use for more complicating thinking). According to the study's authors, that means people who have chills when they listen to music could be having stronger emotional reactions to it. In fact, lead author Matthew E. Sachs told Neuroscience News he thinks these people may have stronger emotional reactions to a lot of things that could be studied in the future. So, if your skin responds to music, that could mean you feel all the feels. (Keep in mind, however, that this sampling is really small.)
Since the areas of the brain that process music and emotions are so interconnected for some people, Sachs told Quartz there's a huge potential for music therapy to treat mental health issues like depression. It could also explain why listening to music is so enjoyable to begin with.
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