I don't have answers as such, but thoughts in response...lamejoke style.

There is a common theory that the human brain searches for things it knows or likes - that's why you only notice how many people have the same style shirt as you do after you buy it, or why you walk into a music store when it's playing a song you like, or...ah, I'll leave this til when my brain is running on sleep rather than caffeine. Sorry. I'll stop trying to be intellekshool now. But...kinda along the same lines? A little? No? Ok.

"déjà vu" moves me? man, and why not the "jamaois vu"? .. both mental "sensations" can be a reason but not the cause
Anyway, personally, the music is what moves me .. and not the psychiatry ... and I think we need an "open mind" hearing music. I do it, and like we say in my land "in the variety u get the good taste" translated word by word, but I think u will get the meaning. Musical "biodiversity" is great.
Good shot, but too much philosophycal to me..
:)

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Now this doesn't have to be obvious familiarity but still there. Like how if you taste a certain range of spreads they all taste the same till you sample again and again. The differences become quite apparant.

Advertised butters tends to be immediate favourites to start with . Additional additional taste tests reveal other spreads are often more enjoyable.

margarine become is popular because it copies most of what butter is about while remaining easier to spread.

Our tastes reflect what we instantly grab and dismiss. People say that the world of Dairy products and edible lubricants are stagnating our arteries but is it this mindset? The casual snacker hardly ever moves past taste test one in unfamiliar terratory.

Does this translate to other forms, soups, vegetables? confectionary probably.

It is like our mind is being weary of the unknown. Possible danger lurks ahead, proceed with caution. Perhaps those that are willing to take more risks are more receptable to foreign tastes.

Aspects that you like in one food preperation style, do you seek them in others. Is that what defines the food we like in styles? As we discover new aspects in a cuisine is the increment parallel in the others?

Oh the questions. Are the answers just staring right back?

//receptable

Oh, Stefan. You're one of the few people who can make up words and it'll actually endear you to me more, instead of making me want to bust a cap in yo' ass.

As for your questions, I think familiarity is the greatest running theme in the universe. Animals naturally oppose change. For the sake of evolution, I suggest we embrace it.

I think the reason that familiarity is so effective in music is because it helps us understand music easily. We tend to like familiar things because we understand them more easily than we do non-familiar things. I didn't really get into hip-hop and drum and bass type music for a long time because I didn't understand it. I didn't understand what to listen for, where the themes lay etc, because it's more beat orientated than what I had grown up with, which was more based on melody.
Its not that we like to hear the same thing again and again, but that we don;t make big jumps easily, unless of course we try. With pop music, you can;t rely on the listeners to 'try' to like it and search for the interest, it has to be immediately apparent. That (I think) is why repetition and familiarity is so succesful in pop music; not because its better or because we like it more, but merely because it communicates with songthing we already understand.
Reusing and well-known music theme is an obvious way of exploiting this. Music considered innovative tends to be more subtle in this technique. Music that is considered cliche uses techniques that have reached their saturation point and are no longer effective. Not that I think people who write music think about it in this way, but I think it could explain why some songs are popular and others aren't.

p.s. a feeble plug for my band: the red circle gang are playing this friday (19th) @ the cross, come along!

[ http://www.redcirclegang.net.nz ]