Why are strings considered different objects in most languages when checking for equality, even if their contents are the same?

In most languages, when comparing strings with the equality operator (for example, == in Java), references to objects are compared, not their contents. Therefore, even if two strings contain the same text but are located in different memory locations, they are considered different objects.

For example, in Java:

String a = new String("test");
String b = new String("test");
System.out.println(a == b); // false, different objects
System.out.println(a.equals(b)); // true, same content

To compare the actual contents of strings, special methods (such as equals in Java) are used, which compare the characters inside the strings rather than the references.