Why can some people wiggle their ears while many can't?
We have nine muscles in our ears that could help them move but most of these muscles are inoperative. Some people, however, about 15 percent of the population, can use some of these muscles to move their external ears to a greater or lesser extent without using their hands. Ear movements are common among mammals especially cats, dogs and horses. These animals have retained the use of their ear muscles as sound and the direction from which it is coming is extremely important to them and they have to be able to move their ears around for this purpose.
