Mind & EverydayHow it works
How you hear your name in a crowded room.
In noise, your brain isolates one voice using direction, pitch and rhythm. The rest isn't deleted, just processed shallowly. If your name appears in that background mass, attention jumps automatically. Colin Cherry described this in 1953; in experiments about a third of people reacted to their name in the ignored ear.
Useful: To reach someone in a noisy room, say their name first.
Source: en.wikipedia.org