essay on disadvantages of music

Studying With Music: Arguments for & Against

Does music really help you study?

• By Sander Tamm
• Aug 4, 2021

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At some point, almost every student has experimented with using background music as a means to study or  work  more efficiently. 

It is no wonder, then, that the iconic YouTube channel  Lofi Girl  is currently approaching the 1B views mark.

But, does music actually make a legitimate difference in the effectiveness of an individual study session?

According to relevant science, listening to music while studying does have its advantages as well as significant disadvantages – one thing is for sure, there is no concrete “yes or no” answer to whether music affects studying positively.

If we leave the science out of it and look at the individual opinions of students, things stay just as complicated – many students swear by background music, while many learners are completely against ANY background noise.

The debate on whether music can help you study or not tends to boil down to two concrete arguments.

One side has the opinion that listening to music helps  improve focus and concentration . The other camp says that they don’t want  any additional noise  because their own thoughts provide enough distraction as it is. Thus, for these students, music seems to make concentration even more difficult.

In this article, we will be looking at both the science and the individual experience of the students. In addition, we will explore both the advantages and disadvantages of listening to music while studying.

Hopefully, the article will let you decide on which option would suit you better –  studying in complete silence or doing the brain crunching with some light background music on.

Without further ado, let’s get started by looking at some advantages of listening to music while studying.

Here’s what you’ll find in this article:

Studying with Music

Arguments for listening to music while studying.

Here are four major advantages of listening to music while studying:

Relaxing music can combat study-related stress

Learning about a new subject or going through a demanding online course can be overwhelming and stressful, even for the brightest of minds. Therefore, it is essential (at least if you want the study session to be fruitful) to study with a positive mindset.

Why? Well,  research  suggests that positive affect (term used in psychology for positive emotions and expression) improves a variety of cognitive processes.

Simply put, you will learn better when you are in a good mood.

This is where listening to music comes in – according to scientists from  Stanford University , music can  change brain functioning  to the same extent as meditation.

It is a quick, easy, and cheap way of flooding your brain with endorphins and reaping the benefits of improved cognitive function immediately.

Music can help with completing repetitive tasks

According to a  study by Fox & Embrey  (1972), music can be a great productivity aid when you need to perform repetitive and more simple tasks.

For example, try listening to music when rewriting or editing a paper. Music can inspire you to tackle these somewhat tedious activities with greater efficiency.

Music can inspire you to tackle these somewhat tedious activities with greater efficiency. For example, try listening to music when rewriting or editing a paper. You’ll quickly see that you work more quickly and efficiently when listening to music.

Music can also make a boring activity seem less boring. Listening to music while doing something mundane, like creating  charting  tables or creating columns for  Cornell notes .

Music can help with memorization

In one way or another, all learning is about memorization. And, according to science, background music can have a  positive impact on human memory .

So, next time you are trying to memorize phrases from an  online language course , have some background music on. It just might give your learning that extra boost.

Listening to music with headphones can cancel noise pollution

In a perfect world, you could always choose exactly where and when you study. Unfortunately, that is not always the case.

There will be times when your study environment will work against you – distractions can come in the form of other family members, roommates, or traffic noise.

In such cases, putting on a pair of headphones would be a great way of fighting  noise pollution . After all, a soothing collection of tunes will be a much better background to your studies than hearing your roommate play video games for hours on end.

Arguments against listening to music while studying

These are the two main drawbacks to listening to music while studying:

Lack of concentration

Whether you consciously notice it or not, your brain will put some extra resources into “decoding” the music playing in the background. This is especially true for songs with lyrics – instead of focusing on your studies, you will unconsciously try to listen to what the singer is saying. This can ultimately  decrease your productivity  by 10%. Thus, for tasks that require cognitively demanding and creative mental work, complete silence would be the best possible solution.

Complete silence  promotes increased blood flow  to the brain. This, in return, directly affects your capability to tackle more demanding mental tasks.

So, if you are planning on mastering a hard skill like  PHP  or  Python , always try to find a place as silent as possible.

Music can trigger bad memories

Music can put you in a positive mood (thus enhancing your cognitive capabilities), but the reverse is also possible.

Some music can come with bad associations and lead you to a more negative state of mind. Which, in return, will dampen your learning capabilities.

You can combat this by avoiding music that is too dark or downbeat. Thinking about your high school heartbreaks is the last thing you want when studying for that Advanced Calculus exam.

4 Tips for using background music to enhance your mental capacity

If you are planning on experimenting with listening to music while studying, there are some things to consider. These tips will help you avoid some mistakes students commonly make when studying with background music.

Avoid music with lyrics!

It is not a coincidence that most of the music associated with studying is entirely instrumental.

According to a study by Perham/Currie (2014), music with lyrics has a negative effect on reading comprehension performance. The same study also finds that the same applies even when the student enjoys the music or already knows the lyrical content.

To conclude, do not choose albums, playlists, or songs with any lyrical content.

If you are not knowledgeable about instrumental music, the Lofi Girl YouTube channel mentioned in the introduction is the best place to start. For further inspiration, we will also list some music styles that we recommend experimenting with.

But, before we get into specific styles, allow me to explain why not all instrumental music works as a backdrop for a learning session.

Use background music that follows clear patterns

We already established that the debate is still on whether listening to music while studying is beneficial or not. But, one thing is clear – the  type of music  you choose for your study sessions matters!

Not any instrumental music is suitable background music by default. Music that is too progressive in nature is likely to throw your brain off the loop and distract you.

For example, listening to jazz while studying might “make sense” to some students, but jazz is quite chaotic in nature. Thus, I wouldn’t choose jazz as background music for studying, even if the pieces are entirely instrumental.

The lo-fi hip-hop beats have become such popular choices for study music because they generally follow a clear, defined rhythm. These beats provide a pleasant background ambiance that does not demand your brain for attention. 

Here are some other examples of music styles suitable for learning:

• Ambient  – Brian Eno, possibly the most famous ambient composer of all time, has described ambient music as music that “induces calm and a space to think”. This is exactly what you want when selecting suitable music for getting some studying done.
• Downtempo  – Similar to ambient, but with a bigger focus on beats. The atmospheric sounds and the mellow beats make downtempo a great backdrop for long study sessions.
• Classical  –  The Mozart Effect  has been effectively  debunked . Listening to classical music does NOT make you smarter. Still, classical music can enhance your mood and put you in the right mind frame for studying. Reading while listening to classical is something that works particularly well for many students.
• Deep house  – An unconventional choice, but something that has worked for me and several other students we interviewed. Deep house has very little variation, the beats are hypnotic, and the rhythms are soothing.

Of course, this is not an exhaustive list. What works for one student, might not work for someone else. So, feel free to experiment with different albums, playlists, and artists to see what works best for your study routine.

Make your choices before the learning sessions

You have probably heard that some of the most high-performing individuals in the world consciously limit their daily choices. This is a great strategy for avoiding decision fatigue as much as possible.

Decision fatigue is the last thing you want when engaging in mentally demanding work such as studying. Thus, if you are planning on studying with background music playing, choose your music well in advance. Preferably the day before your learning session.

Take regular breaks

You can use the stopping of music as a cue for a study break. For example, prepare separate playlists for your learning sessions. When one playlist is finished, take a break.

Since your brain has learned to associate music with studying, you will find it that much easier to relax and switch off when the music stops.

When you resume learning, your mind will be fully refreshed and ready to absorb new information.

The usefulness of background music for studying depends on many variables. It all comes down to the specific music listened to, what you are studying, and the environment where you study.

Of course, the personality and the study habits of a given student are also important.

Everyone has different preferences, so you will need to experiment with what works for you. Some people may find that listening to music while studying helps them focus more and retain information better. Others will do better in silence without any noise at all.

The scientific evidence is also inconclusive. Some studies show that music can help improve attention and memory, while other studies find no benefits for listening to music while studying.

If you do decide to experiment with having background music on while studying, there are some key takeaways to consider.

For one, anything with lyrics should be avoided. The same goes for music that is too loud and intense or too progressive. Instead, opt for music that is repetitive and classically pleasant.

Also, be sure to prepare your playlists or streams BEFORE starting studying. Choosing songs while engaging with your studies is a surefire formula for throwing your brain off the loop and hurting your concentration levels.

Sander Tamm

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6 Ways Music Can Be Damaging

New research helps us understand—and prevent—music-induced harm..

Posted September 30, 2020 | Reviewed by Gary Drevitch

There’s little that doubt music can have a positive impact on our health and well-being. We turn it on for motivation when exercising, we choose tunes to help set a certain mood, and we have it playing in the background to help us stay focused. But if we acknowledge the benefits of music, what about the flip side?

A recent article in the Journal of Music Therapy focused on examining the idea of music-induced harm, or MIH. First, the authors addressed the challenge of defining these two complex concepts. Harm , they wrote, is an idiosyncratic experience impacted by multiple variables. It can be deliberate (or not), self-induced (or not), experienced in different ways (emotionally, cognitively, spiritually, bodily, etc.), and impacted by other factors (such as the immediate situation). Music is also a complex construct. It can be live or recorded, passive or active, and like harm can be experienced in multiple ways—emotionally, socially, and physically, to name a few.

Although this article is not the first exploration (or even the first formal acknowledgment) that music can lead to harm, what these authors attempted to do was conceptualize how music can cause harm. In other words, they sought to develop a way of understanding MIH through identifying relevant variables and considerations.

To do this, the authors considered a number of existing models and frameworks on topics such as contextual factors in clinical work, cultural humility, social justice, ethical decision-making , and the role of music in intervention. What emerged was a model with six major factors identified. Each provides a way of understanding how music can cause harm, which also speaks to points at which harm can be prevented. The six major factors, with some associated considerations they listed, include:

• The Deliverer. This is the person who selected and/or provided the music. Consider the qualifications and training of this individual, their purpose for delivering the music, their level of cultural humility and awareness, and their personality characteristics.
• The Recipient. This is the person who receives the music. It can be the same person as the deliverer (i.e., through self-selected music) or someone different. Here, consider their level of self-awareness, musical training and background, personality characteristics, current emotional state, and whether or not they consented to be involved in the musical experience.
• The Music. This relates to how the music was delivered, how long it lasted, how loud it was, and how it was selected.
• The Context. This includes the current setting (Was this in a hospital? At home? School? In a public space?), sociocultural norms and expectations, and how the music was delivered (by an individual or a group).
• The Interplays. This factor describes the bidirectional relationships between the first four factors—deliverer, recipient, music, and context. This is where much of the complexity lies. Considerations included with this factor include things like: What associations might the deliverer and recipient have with the music? Do any elements of the context support or threaten the recipient's autonomy? How might the recipient’s musical preferences influence their experience? What was the purpose for using the music? What is the relationship between the deliverer and the recipient?
• The Harm . In this model, the authors identified seven possible types of harm: affective, behavioral, cognitive, identity , interpersonal, physical, and spiritual .

Now, imagine you're experiencing an intensely negative reaction to a piece of music you hear. How might this model help you understand what happened (and keep it from happening in the future)? You might consider the following:

• Did you have a choice as to whether or not you wanted to hear the music?
• Were you able to choose what music you wanted to listen to?
• Did you like the music?
• Were you familiar with the music?
• Was anything else happening in that moment that influenced your reaction? Were you calm or stressed ? Happy or angry? Focused or distracted?
• Did the music remind you of anyone?
• Who was performing the music? Do you have any connections or associations (good or bad) with that artist?

This is not an exhaustive list, but thanks to the music therapists who developed the MIH model, it provides us with a starting point for understanding how music can cause harm—and what we could possibly do to prevent that from happening.

Silverman, M. H., Gooding, L. F., & Yinger, O. (2020). It's...complicated: A theoretical model of music-induced harm. Journal of Music Therapy, 57 (3), 251-281. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmt/thaa008

Kimberly Sena Moore, Ph.D., MT-BC, is a board-certified music therapist, blogger, and Associate Director of the Bower School of Music at Florida Gulf Coast University.

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Changing positive and negative affects through music experiences: a study with university students

• José Salvador Blasco-Magraner 1 ,
• Gloria Bernabé-Valero 2 ,
• Pablo Marín-Liébana 1 &
• Ana María Botella-Nicolás 1  

BMC Psychology volume  11 , Article number:  76 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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Currently, there are few empirical studies that demonstrate the effects of music on specific emotions, especially in the educational context. For this reason, this study was carried out to examine the impact of music to identify affective changes after exposure to three musical stimuli.

The participants were 71 university students engaged in a music education course and none of them were musicians. Changes in the affective state of non-musical student teachers were studied after listening to three pieces of music. An inter-subject repeated measures ANOVA test was carried out using the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) to measure their affective state.

The results revealed that: (i) the three musical experiences were beneficial in increasing positive affects and reducing negative affects, with significant differences between the interaction of Music Experiences × Moment (pre-post); (ii) listening to Mahler’s sad fifth symphony reduced more negative affects than the other experimental conditions; (iii) performing the blues had the highest positive effects.

Conclusions

These findings provide applied keys aspects for music education and research, as they show empirical evidence on how music can modify specific affects of personal experience.

Peer Review reports

Introduction

The studies published on the benefits of music have been on the increase in the last two decades [ 1 , 2 , 3 ] and have branched out into different areas of research such as psychology [ 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ], education [ 1 , 9 , 10 ] and health [ 11 , 12 ] providing ways of using music as a resource for people’s improvement.

The publication in 1996 of the famous report “Education Hides a Treasure” submitted to the UNESCO by the International Commission was an important landmark in the educational field. This report pointed out the four basic pillars of twenty-first century education: learning to know, learning to do, learning to live together, and learning to be [ 13 ]. The two last ones clearly refer to emotional education. This document posed a challenge to Education in terms of both academically and emotionally development at all levels from kindergarten to university. In this regard, there has been a notable increase in the number of studies that have shown the strong impact of music on the emotions in the different stages of education and our lives. For example, from childhood to adolescence, involving primary, secondary and university education, music is especially relevant for its beneficial effects on developing students’ emotional intelligence and prosocial skills [ 1 , 14 ]. In adults, music benefits emotional self-regulation [ 15 ], while in old age it helps to maintain emotional welfare and to experience and express spirituality [ 16 ]. This underlines the importance of providing empirical evidence on the emotional influence of music.

Influence of music on positive affects

Numerous studies have used the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) to evaluate the emotional impact of music [ 17 ]. This scale is valid and effective for measuring the influence of positive and negative effects of music on listeners and performers [ 10 , 18 , 19 ]. Thus, for example, empirical evidence shows that exposure to a musical stimulus favours the increase of positive affects [ 20 , 21 ] found a significant increase in three positive affects in secondary school students after listening to music, and the same results has been found after listening to diverse musical styles. These results are consistent with Schubert [ 22 ], who demonstrated that music seems to improve or maintain well-being by means of positive valence emotions (e. g. happiness, joy and calm). Other research studied extreme metal fans aged between 18 and 34 years old and found statements of physiological excitement together with increased positive affects [ 21 ]. Positive outcomes after listening to sad music have also been found [ 23 ], who played Samuel Barbers’ Adagio for Strings , described by the BBC as the world’s saddest piece of classical music, to 20 advanced music students and 20 advanced psychology students with no musical background and subsequently found that the music only had positive affects on both groups.

Several experimental designs that used sad music on university students noticed that they experienced both sadness and positive affects [ 24 , 25 ] and also found that music labeled as “happy” increased positive affects while the one labeled as “sad” reduced both positive and negative affects [ 26 ]. For other authors the strongest and most pleasant responses to sad music are associated with empathy [ 27 ]. Moreover, listening to sad music had benefits since attributes of empathy were intensified [ 27 , 28 ]. In relation to musical performances, empirical evidence found a significant increase in positive affects [ 29 ]. Thus, music induces listeners to experience positive affects, which could turn music into an instrument for personal development.

Following on from Fredrickson’s ‘broaden‐and‐build’ framework of positive emotions [ 30 ], positive affects cause changes in cognitive activities which, in turn, can cause behaviour changes. They can also expand the possibilities for action and improve physical resources. According to Fredrickson [ 30 ], positive affects trigger three sequential effects: (1) amplification of the scope for thought and action; (2) construction of personal resources to deal with difficult simplifications; (3) personal transformation by making one more creative, with a better understanding of situations, better able to face up to difficulties and better socially integrated. This leads to an “upward spiral” in which even more positive affects are experienced. A resource such as music that can increase positive affects, can therefore be considered as a step forward in personal transformation. Thus, music teachers could have a powerful tool to help students enhance their personal development.

Influence of music on negative affects

There is a great deal of controversy as regards the influence of music on negative affects. Blasco and Calatrava [ 20 ] found a significant reduction of five negative affects in secondary school students after listening to Arturo Marquez’s typically happy Danzón N O 2. Different results were found in an experiment in which the change in participants ‘affects was assessed after listening the happy "Eye of the Tiger" by Survivor and the sad "Everybody Hurts" by REM [ 26 ]. They found that the happy piece only increased the positive affects but did not reduce the negative ones, while the sad piece reduced both positive and negative affects. However, neither of these findings agree with Miller and Au [ 31 ], who carried out an experiment to compare the influence of sad and happy music on undergraduates ‘mood arousal and found that listening to both types had no significant changes on negative affects. Shulte [ 32 ] conducted a study with 30 university students to examine the impact that nostalgic music has on affects, and found that after listening to different songs, negative affects decreased. Matsumoto [ 33 ] found that sad music reduced sad feelings in deeply sad university students, while Vuoskoski and Eerola [ 34 ] showed that sad music could produce changes in memory and emotional judgements related to emotions and that experiencing music-induced sadness is intrinsically more pleasant than sad memories. It therefore seems that reducing negative affects has mostly been studied with sad and nostalgic musical stimuli. In this way, if music can reduce negative affects, it can also be involved in educational and psychological interventions focused on improving the emotional-affective sphere. Thus, for example, one study examined the effects of a wide range of music activities and found that it would be necessary to specify exactly what types of music activity lead to what types of outcomes [ 2 ]. Moore [ 3 ] also found that certain music experiences and characteristics had both desirable and undesirable effects on the neural activation patterns involved in emotion regulation. Furthermore, recent research on university students shows that music could be used to assess mood congruence effects, since these effects are reactions to the emotions evoked by music [ 35 ].

These studies demonstrate that emotional experience can be actively driven by music. Moreover, they synthesize the efforts to find ways in which music can enhance affective emotional experience by increasing positive affects and reducing the negative ones (e. g. hostility, nervousness and irritability). Although negative emotions have a great value for personal development and are necessary for psychological adjustment, coping with them and self-regulation capacities are issues that have concerned psychology. For example, Emotional Intelligence [ 36 ], which has currently been established in the educational field, constitutes a fundamental conceptual framework to increase well-being when facing negative emotions, providing keys for greater control and management of emotional reactions. It also establishes how to decrease the intensity and frequency of negative emotional states [ 37 ], providing techniques such as mindfulness meditation that have proven their effectiveness in reducing negative emotional experiences and increasing the positive ones [ 38 ]. The purpose of this research is to find whether music can be part of the varied set of resources that can be used by a teacher to modify students’ emotional experience.

Thus, although empirical evidence of the effects of music on the emotional sphere is still incipient. It seems that they can increase positive effects, but it is not clear their impact on the negative ones, since diverse and contradictory results (no change and reduction of negative affects after listening to music) were found. In addition, the effects of the type of musical piece (e.g. happy or sad music) need further investigation as different effects were found. Moreover, previous studies do not compare between the effects of listening to versus performing music. Such an approach could provide keys to highlight the importance of performing within music education. Therefore, this study aims to contribute to this scientific field, providing experimental evidence on the effects of listening to music as compared to performing music, as well as determining the effects of different types of music on positive and negative affects.

To this end, the effects of three different types of music experiences were compared: (1) listening to a sad piece, (2) listening to an epic and solemn piece, and (3) performing of a rhythm and a blues piece, to determine whether positive and negative affects were modified after exposure to these experimental situations. In particular, two hypotheses guided this study: (1) After exposure to each musical experience (listening to a sad piece; listening to a solemn piece and playing a blues), all participants will improve their emotional experience, increasing their positive affects and reducing their negative ones; and (2) the music performance will induce a greater change as compared to the listening conditions.

Participants

A total of 71 students were involved in this study, 6 men and 65 women between the ages of 20 and 40, who were studying a Teaching Grade. These students were enrolled in the "Music Education" program as part of their university degree’s syllabus. None of them had special music studies from conservatories, academies or were self-taught; thus, all had similar musical knowledge. None of them had previously listened to music in an instructional context nor had performed music with their fellow students. In addition, none of them had listening before to the musical pieces selected for this experiment.

All signed an informed consent form before participating and no payment was given for taking part in the study. As the experiment was carried out in the context of a university course, they were assured that their participation and responses would be anonymous and would have no impact on their qualifications. The research was approved by the ethical committee at the Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir: UCV2017- 18-28 code.

Questionnaire

To assess emotional states, the Positive and Negative Affective States scales (PANAS), was administered [ 39 ]. In particular, the Spanish version of the scale [ 17 ], whose study shows a high degree of internal consistency; in males 0.89 in positive affects and 0.91 in negative affects; in women 0.87 in positive affects and 0.89 in negative affects. In this study, good reliability level in each experimental condition was obtained (0.836–0.913 for positive affects and 0.805–0.917 for negative affects (see Table 1 for more information on Cronbach’s α for each experimental condition).

The PANAS consists of 20 items which describe different dimensions of emotional experience. Participants must answer them regarding to their current affective state. The scale is composed of 20 items; 10 positive affects (PA) and 10 negative affects (NA). Answers are graded in a 5-options (Likert scale), with reversed items, ranging from extremely (1) to very slightly or not at all (5).

Musical pieces

The musical pieces choice stemmed from the analysis of some of the music elements that most influence the perception of emotions: mode, melody and intervals. Within the melody, range and melodic direction were distinguished. The range or amplitude of the melodic line is commonly divided into wide or narrow, while the melodic direction is often classified as ascending or descending. Chang and Hoffman [ 10 ] associated narrow amplitude melodies with sadness, while Schimmark and Grob [ 40 ] related melodic amplitude with highly activated emotions. Regarding the melodic direction, Gerardi and Gerken [ 41 ] found a relationship between ascending direction and happiness and heroism, and between descending direction and sadness.

In relation to the mode, Tizón [ 42 ] stated that the major one is completely happy, while the minor one represents sadness. Thompson and Robitaille [ 43 ] considered that, in order to cause emotions such as happiness, solemnity or joy, composers use tonal melodies, while to obtain negative emotions, they use atonality and chromaticism.

In this research, the selected pieces (“Adagietto” from Gustav Mahler's Fifth Symphony, MML; and “Titans” from Alexander The Great from Vangelis, VML) are representative examples of the melodic, intervallic and modal characteristics previously exposed. Mahler's and Vangelis's pieces completely differ in modes and melodic amplitude (sad vs. heroism). Likewise, Mahler's piece is much more chromatic than Vangelis' one, which has a broader melody made up of third, fourth and fifth intervals, often representative of heroism. Those features justify the fact that they have been used as soundtracks in two films belonging to the epic genre (Alexander The Great, 2004) and drama (Death in Venice, 1971).

The musical piece that was performed by the students was chosen in order to be easy to learn in a few sessions, since they were not musicians. So, three musical pieces were used for the experimental conditions, the first two musical pieces were recordings in a CD, while the third one was performed by the subjects.

The three chosen pieces are described below:

Condition 1 (MML): “Adagietto” from Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony (9:01 min), performed by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Claudio Abbado [ 44 ]. This is a sad, melancholic and dramatic piece that Luchino Visconti used in the film Death in Venice, made in 1971 and based on the book by Thomas Mann.

Condition 2 (VML): “Titans Theme” from Alexander the Great (3:59 min), directed by Oliver Stone and premiered in 2004, whose music was composed, produced and performed by Vangelis [ 45 ]. It has a markedly epic character with large doses of heroism and solemnity.

Condition 3 (BP): “Rhythm’s Blues” composed and played by Ana Bort (4:00 min). This is a popular African-American piece of music with an insistent rhythm and harmonically sustained by tonal degrees. This piece was performed by the participants using percussion instruments (carillons and a range of xylophones and metallophones).

The sample was divided into two groups (N 1  = 36 and N 2  = 35) that participated separately in all the phases of the study. The first two conditions (MML and VML) were carried out in each group's classroom, while the performance (BP) was developed in the musical instruments room. This room had 52 percussion instruments, including different types of chimes, xylophones and metallophones (soprano, alto and bass). It is a large space where there are only chairs and musical instruments and stands. The first group was distributed as follows: 6 chimes (3 soprano and 3 alto), 5 soprano xylophones, 5 alto xylophones, 5 bass xylophones, 5 soprano metallophones, 5 alto metallophones and 5 bass metallophones. The distribution of the second group was similar, but with one less alto metallophone.

Prior to the experiment, participants received two practical lessons in order to learn how to collectively perform the music score (third experimental condition). After the two practical lessons, during the next three sessions (leaving two weeks between each session), the experiment was carried out. In each session, an experimental condition was applied and PANAS was on-line administered online beforehand and afterwards (Pre-Post design). All participants were exposed to the three experimental conditions and completed the scale before and after listening to music.

In each of these three sessions, a different music condition was applied: MML in the first one, VML in the second one and BP in the third one.

As conditions VML and MML were listening to pieces of music, the instructions received by the subjects were: “You are going to listen to a musical piece, you ought to listen actively, avoiding distractions. You can close your eyes if you feel like to”. For the BP condition, they were said to play the musical sheet all together.

The aim of the study was to examine the effect of the music experience variable (with three levels: MML, VML and BP) in the Positive and Negative Affects subscales from the PANAS scale. The variable Moment was also studied to control biases and to analyze differences between the Pre and Post conditions.

The experiment was designed as a two-way repeated measure (RM) ANOVA with two dependent variables: Positive Affects and Negative Affects, one for each PANAS’ subscales.

The two repeated measures used in the experiment were the variables Musical Experience (ME), with three levels (MML, VML and BP) and the variable Moment, with two levels (PRE and POST). All participants were exposed to the three experimental conditions.

The design did not include a control group, similar to many other studies in the field of music psychology [ 27 , 30 ]. The control was carried out from the intra-subject pre-post measurement of all the participants. The rationale for this design lies in the complexity of the control condition (or placebo) design in psychology [ 46 ]. While placebos in pharmacological trials are sugar pills, in psychology it is difficult to establish an equivalent period of time similar to the musical pieces (e. g. 9 min) without activity, so that cognitive activity occurred during this period of time (e. g. daydreaming, reading a story, etc.) could bias and limit the generalization of results.

Additionally, one of the goals of this study was to compare the effects of listening to music compared to performance on affects. For this reason, two music listening experiences (MML and VML) and a musical performance experience (BP) were designed. In order to control potential biases, participants did not know the musical pieces in the experimental conditions and they had a low level of musical performance competence (musicians were excluded).

It was used SPSS statistics v.26 for the statistical analyzes.

Two ANOVA were performed. The first one, analyzed two dependent variables at the same time: Positive Affects (PA) and Negative Affects (NA).

In the second ANOVA, the 20 items of the PANAS scale were taken as dependent variables. The rest of the experimental design was similar to the first one, a two-way RM ANOVA with variables Musical Experience (ME) and Moment as repeated measures.

Examination of frequency distributions, histograms, and tests of homogeneity of variance and normality for the criterion measures indicated that the assumptions for the use of parametric statistics were met. Normality was met in all tests except for one, but the ANOVA is robust against this assumption violation. All the analyses presented were performed with the significance level (alpha) set at 0.05, two-tailed tests. Means and standard deviations for the 6 experimental conditions for both subscales, Positive Affects and Negative Affects, are presented in Table 1 .

Mauchly’s test of sphericity was statistically significant for Musical Experience and Musical Experience*Moment focusing on NA as the dependent variable ( p  < 0.05). The test only was significant for Musical Experience for PA as dependent variable ( p  < 0.05). The rest of the W’s Mauchly were not significant ( p  > 0.05), so we assumed sphericity for the non-mentioned variables and worked with the assumed sphericity univariate solution. For the variables which the W’s Mauchly was significant, the univariate solution was also taken, but choosing the corrected Greenhouse–Geisser epsilon approximation due to its conservativeness.

A significant principal effect of the Musical Experience variable F(1.710,119.691) = 22.505, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.243; the Moment variable F(1,70) = 45.291, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.393; and the Musical Experience*Moment interaction F(2,140) = 32.502, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.317 were found for PA.

Statistically significance was found for Moment F(1, 70) = 70.729, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.503 and Musical Experience*Moment interaction F(1.822, 127.555) = 8.594, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.109, but not for Musical Experience F(1.593, 111.540) = 2.713, p  < 0.05, η 2  = 0.037, for the other dependent variable, NA.

Table 2 shows pairwise comparisons between Musical Experience levels. Bonferroni’s correction was applied in order to control type I error. We only interpret the results for the Positive Affects because the Musical Experience effect was not statistically significant for Negative Affects. Results show that condition VML presents a significant higher punctuation in Positive Affects than the other two conditions ( p  < 0.05). It also shows that the musical condition MML is significantly above BP in Positive Affects ( p  < 0.05).

As regards Moment variable (Table 3 ), all but one Pre-Post differences were statistically significant ( p  < 0.05) for all the three conditions for both Positive and Negative Affects dependent variables. The Pre-Post difference found in Positive Affects for the VML Musical Experience did not reach the statistical level ( p  = 0.319).

Focusing on these statistically significant differences, we observe that conditions MML and BP, for PA, decreased from Pre to Post condition, indicating that positive emotions increased significantly between pre and post measures. On the other hand, for NA, all conditions increased from Pre to Post conditions, indicating that negative affects were decreased between pre and post conditions. Once again, one should bear in mind that items were reversed, thus, a higher scores in NA means a decrease in affects.

In order to measure the interaction effect, significant differences between simple effects were analysed.

The simple effect of Moment (level2-level1) in the first Music Experience condition (MML) in PA was compared with the simple effect of Moment (level2-level1) in the second Musical Experience condition (VML). Music Experience conditions 2–3 (VML-BP) and 1–3 (MML-BP) were compared in the same way. Thus, taking into account PA and NA variables, a total of 6 comparisons, 3 per dependent variable, were made.

The results of these comparisons are shown in Table 4 . Comparisons for PA range from T1 to T3 and comparisons for NA range from T4 to T6. All of them are significant ( p  < 0.05) which means that there are statistically significant differences between all the Musical Experience conditions when comparing the Moment (pre/post) simple effects.

In Table 5 , we can look at the differences’ values. As we said before the differences between Pre and Post conditions are significant when comparing the three musical conditions. The biggest difference for positive affects is between MML and BP (T3 = 8.443), and between VML and MML (T4 = − 6.887) for negative affects.

In this second part, the results obtained from the second two-way RM ANOVA with the 20 items as dependent variables are considered. Results of the descriptive analysis of each item: Interested, Excited, Strong, Enthusiastic, Proud, Alert, Inspired, Determined, Attentive, Active, Distressed, Upset, Guilty, Afraid, Hostile, Irritable, Ashamed, Nervous, Jittery, Scared ; in each musical condition: MML, VML and BP; and for the PRE and POST measurements, can be found in the Additional file 1 (Appendix A).

As regards the ANOVA test that compares the three experimental conditions in each mood, Mauchly’s Sphericity Test indicates that sphericity cannot be assumed for the musical experience in most of the variables of the items of effects, except for Interested, Alert, Inspired, Active and Irritable . For these items, the highest observed power index among Greenhouse–Geisser, Huynh–Feldt and Lower-bound epsilon corrections was taken for each variable. For the interaction Musical Experience*Moment, sphericity was not assumed for Distressed, Guilty, Hostile and Scared . For these items, the same above-cited criterion was followed.

Musical experience has a principal effect on all the positive affects, but only has it for 5 negative affects ( Nervous, Jittery, Scared, Hostile and Upset ) ( p  < 0.05). For more detail see Table S1 from Additional file 1 : Appendix B.

The principal effect of Moment is also statistically significant ( p  < 0.05) for all (positive and negative), but two items: Guilty ( p  = 0.073) and Hostile ( p  = 0.123). All the differences between Pre and Post for positive affects are positive, which means that scores in conditions Pre were significantly higher than in condition Post. The other way around occurs for negative affects, all the differences Pre-Post are negative, meaning that the Post condition is significantly higher than the Pre condition. For more detail, see Table S2 from Additional file 1 : Appendix B. In this way, Pre-post changes (Moment) improve affective states; the positive affects increase while the negative are reduced, except for Guilty ( p  = 0.073) and Hostile ( p  = 0.123).

Comparing the proportion of variance explained by the musical experienced and Moment (Tables s1 and s2 from the Additional file 1 : Appendix B), it is observed that most of the η 2 scores in musical experience are below 0.170, except Active and Alert , which are higher. On the other hand, the η 2 scores for Moment are close to 0.300. From these results we can state that, taking only one of the variables at a time, the proportion of the dependent variable’s variance explained by Moment is higher than the proportion of the dependent variable’s variance explained by Musical Experience.

The effect of interaction, shown in Table S3 from the Additional file 1 : Appendix B is significant in 7 positive moods ( Interested, Excited, Enthusiastic, Alert, Determined, Active and Proud ) and 4 negative moods ( Hostile , Irritable, Nervous , and Jittery ).

The pairwise comparisons of Musical Experience’s levels show a wide variety of patterns. Looking at Positive Affects, there is only one item ( Active ) which present significant differences between the three musical conditions. Items Concentrated and Decided do not present any significant difference between any musical conditions. The rest of the Positive items show at least one significant difference between conditions VML and BP. All differences are positive when comparing VML-MML, VML-BP MML-BP, except for Alert and Proud. So, in general, scores are higher for the first two conditions in relation to the third one, meaning that third musical condition presents the biggest increase for Positive Affects (remember items where reversed). For more detail see Additional file 1 : Appendix C.

As regard pairwise comparisons of Musical Experience’s for negative affects, only the items which had a significant principal effect of the variable Musical Experience are shown here. There is a significant difference between conditions VML and MML in item Nervous ; between VML and BP for Scared ( p  < 0.05). For Jittery ; all three conditions differed significantly from each other ( p  < 0.05). Conditions MML and BP differed significantly for Hostile ( p  < 0.05) and conditions VML and BP almost differed significantly for Upset item, but null hypothesis cannot be rejected as p  = 0.056. For more detail see Additional file 1 : Appendix C. All differences were negative when comparing VML-MML, VML-BP MML-BP, except for Nervous and Jittery . So, in general, scores are lower for the first and second condition in relation to the third one.

Positive effects increased significantly during the post phase of all the music experiences, showing that exposure to any of the three music stimuli improved positive affectivity. There were also significant differences between the three experiences in this phase, according to the following order of improvements in positive affectivity: (1) the rhythm and blues performance (BP), (2) listening to Mahler (MML) and (3) listening to Vangelis (VML). As regards the effects of the musical experience x Moment interaction , all the comparisons were significant, with bigger differences in the interpretation of the blues (BP) than in listening to Mahler (MML) and Vangelis (VML). However, the comparison between both experiences, although significant, was smaller. These results indicate that performing music is significantly effective in increasing positive effects. We will explain these results in greater detail below as regards the specific affective states.

As regards Negative Affects, the comparison of the simple effects showed that these decreased after the musical experiences, although in this first analysis the VML musical experience did not differ from the other two. However, the results of the effects of the interaction between musical experiencie x Moment showed that all the comparisons were significant, with a larger difference between MML and VML than the one between BP and each of the other experiences. Listening to Mahler (MML) was more effective in reducing negative affects, compared to both listening to Vangelis and interpreting the blues (BP). These results agree with previous studies [ 26 , 32 ], in which listening to sad music helped to reduce negative affectivity. In this study, it was the most effective condition, although exposure to all three musical experiences reduced negative affects.

The analysis of the specific affective states shows that most items that belong to Positive Affect scale are the most sensitive ones to the PRE-POST change, the different musical conditions and the interpretation of both effects. However, some items of the Negative Affect scale did not differ in the different music conditions or in the music experience × Moment interaction . For example, there were two items (Guilty and Hostile) that did not obtain significance. These results are consistent with the fact that music has certain limits as regards its impact on people’s affects and does not influence all equally. For example, Guilty has profound psychological implications that cannot be affected by simple exposure to certain musical experiences. This means we should be cautious in inferring that music alone can have therapeutical effects on complex emotional states whose treatment should include empirically validated methods. Also, emotional experiences are widely diverse so that any instrument used to measure them is limited as regards the affective/emotional state under study. These results suggest the importance of reviewing the items that compose the PANAS scale in musical studies to adapt it in order to include affective states more sensitive to musical experiences and eliminate the least relevant items.

The analysis of the results in the specific affective states, allows us to delve deeper into each experimental condition. Thus, regarding the results obtained in the complete scale of PANAS, listening to Mahler (MML), causes desirable changes by raising two positive affects ( Inspired and Attentive ) and reducing 10 negative affects ( Distressed, Upset, Afraid, Hostile, Irritable, Ashamed, Nervous, Jittery, and Scared ). This shows that this music condition had a greater effect on the negative affects than the other ones. These results agree with previous studies [ 26 , 32 ], which found that sad music could effectively reduce negative affects, although other studies came to the opposite conclusion. For instance, Miller and Au [ 31 ] found that sad music did not significantly change negative affects. Some authors [ 47 , 48 ] have argued that adults prefer to listen to sad music to regulate their feelings after a negative psychological experience in order to feel better. Taruffi and Koelsch [ 49 ] concluded that sad music could induce listeners to a wide range of positive effects, after a study with 772 participants. In order to contribute to this debate. It would be interesting to control personality variables that might explain these differences on the specific emotions evoked by sad music. In this study, it has been shown that a sad piece of music can be more effective in reducing negative affects than in increasing positive ones. Although the results come from undergraduate students, similar outcomes could be obtained from children and adolescents, although further research is required. In fact, Borella et al. [ 50 ] studied the influence of age on the effects of music and found that the emotional effects influenced cognitive performance (working memory) in such a way that the type of music (Mozart vs. Albinoni) had a stronger influence on young people than on adults. Kawakami and Hatahira [ 28 ], in a study on 84 primary schoolchildren, also found that exposure to sad music pleased them and their level of empathy correlated with their taste for sad music.

Listening to Vangelis (VML) increased 3 positive affects ( Excited, Inspired and Attentive ) and reduced 8 negative affects ( Distressed, Upset, Afraid, Irritable, Ashamed, Nervous, Jittery , and Scared ). Surprisingly, two positive affects were reduced in this experimental condition ( Alert and Attentive ). It could be explained due to the characteristic ostinato rhythm of this piece of music. It was found a similar effect in the study by Campbell et al., [ 26 ] in which sad music reduced both positive and negative affects. This musical condition also managed to modify negative affects more than positive ones.

Performing the blues (BP) increased all 10 positive affects, indicating that performing is more effective in increasing positive affects than listening. These results agree with the study by Dunbar et al. [ 29 ], who found that music performance significantly increased positive affects.

Performing the blues (BP) reduced 6 negative affects, although it was more effective in increasing positive affective states. Vigorous rhythmic music was also found to be positively associated with the use of all the forms of regulating emotions, which suggests that this type of music is especially useful for emotion modulation [ 51 ]. It was found an exception, since Jittery increased after the blues performance. It could be explained by the negative experience that is sometimes associated with music performance. Therefore, it should be taken into account that music performance could increase some negative effects. For example, Dimsdale et al. [ 52 ] found that a strong negative emotional response to a certain type of music in adolescents was related to risk behaviour, indicating that research into the repertory of music experiences needs to be broadened to diverse styles in different age groups to identify all the types of emotional response and their psychological consequences. However, this result should be taken with caution and further research should focus on whether the effect of increased agitation is usual after music performances.

To sum up, this study contributes to the scientific field on the following points: (1) all the musical experiences had significant effects on improving emotional states, increasing positive affects and decreasing the negative ones, which shows the importance of musical experiences on improving the affective sphere; (2) the specific affects that increased, decreased or did not change for each musical experience were identified, providing specific and useful keys for the design of future interventions; and (3) the differences between various types of musical experiences were analyzed, finding more improvements in the performing conditions than in the listening ones.

Limitations and future directions

Limitations.

The sample, made up of university students with a very homogeneous profile in terms of age and sociodemographic characteristics, could limit the generalization of the results. In addition, the low percentage of men in the sample could also affect the generalizability of the results, although no previous studies have reported gender-based differential effects on the positive and negative affects after musical experiences.

Besides, the choice of the pieces of music was based on theoretical criteria and students’ music preferences were not taken into account. This will be included in future research, since the specific choice of the pieces could affect the positive or negative valence of participants’ emotions. However, the goal of using pieces of music not chosen by participants was to elicit new musical experiences for them. Furthermore, no participant was a musician and none of them had previous knowledge of any of the pieces, which may lead to a bias in the results.

In relation to this, the huge amount of available pieces of music, all of them influenced by their cultural and historical context, make it difficult to generalize that certain music parameters correlate with specific emotions. It would be necessary a cross-cultural approach to reach that conclusion.

Future directions

It is recommended to introduce the variables of music preferences and music history to control their effect on the results and to be able to compare the different musical parameters of the pieces together with participants’ preferences.

Likewise, it would be interesting to identify the affects with a greater or lesser degree of influence by music, to adjust the psychological evaluation instrument to the characteristics of the experiment, including items of emotions that can be modified after exposure to a music experience.

The PANAS manual [ 39 ] indicates that a wide variety of affective states (60) and eight different temporal instructions were included in its construction, showing its great versatility. In further research, this instrument should be adapted to for a more specific application to music studies. For instance, by including other emotional states that could be related with the influence of music (e.g. Tranquility , Gratitude , Elevation ), in order to measure more exactly the effects of music on people’s affective experiences.

Accordingly, it would be interesting to evaluate participants' affective traits to establish a baseline and control personality variables, helping to delve into the different levels of the hierarchical structure of affectivity and its relationship with the various music parameters.

Finally, it is recommended that the psychology of music include objective psychophysiological measurements together with self-report evaluations, so that conclusions arising from the experiments have greater robustness and can increase the impact of the contribution to the scientific community.

This study have shown how different music experiences, such as listening and performing, influence the changes in positive and negative affects in student teachers. The results show that the three musical experiences studied are effective in improving the affects by comparing the emotional states before and after the music experiences. It was also showed that there are differences between the effects obtained in each of the music experiences. Besides, improving both types of affects will depend largely on the selected music for the purpose. Although further evidence is required, the results support the importance of music in education, since it provides tools to increase positive affects and to decrease the negative ones, which is important for emotional intelligence development [ 53 , 54 ].

The three music experiences studied are more effective in reducing negative emotional states than in increasing the positive ones. This finding provides useful clues for music teachers to provide strategies that favor emotional regulation. For instance, in order to reduce hostility, irritability and nervousness, students could be exposed to musical auditions of both sad and solemn pieces, choosing musical pieces with similar characteristics to those described in this study. These auditions will be a resource for stress management in the classroom, as well as a tool that students can adopt and generalize to other contexts. Moreover, it is highly likely that students have not heard this type of music before and this experience could increase their repertoire of musical preferences, enhancing their emotional regulation.

The blues performance had a greater impact on participants' positive affects than listening to the other two pieces so, if any teacher wants to increase them (e.g., enthusiasm, interest, etc.), students could be asked to perform simple pieces such as Rhythm's Blues. In this way, musical performance could increase students' resources, contributing to higher levels of motivation, concentration and interest, which promotes learning [ 55 , 56 , 57 , 58 ]. Likewise, it could be very useful for elementary and secondary music teachers, who will be able to contribute to socio-emotional improvement and personal development of their students. Particularly, musical experiences could be a valuable resource for secondary teachers, since music is important in adolescents' lives and can be an interesting tool for meeting their emotional needs [ 59 ]. This is supported by Kokotsaki and Hallam [ 60 ], who consider that performing music helps students feel like active agents of a group, develop a strong sense of belonging, gain popularity, make "like-minded" relationships, improve their social skills and foster a strong sense of self-esteem and satisfaction.

This study shows that experiencing with various unknown musical pieces can have positive effects on emotions. According to this finding, university professors of Teaching grade in music education should encourage future teachers to experience various musical styles, rhythms and tonalities, avoiding prejudices. Thereby, future music teachers will be able to use a diversity of musical experiences that broaden the emotional effects and fulfill the socio-emotional function of music education. In relation to Fredrickson's 'broaden‐and‐build' framework of positive emotions [ 30 ], music can become a mean of widening other positive emotional states, constructing personal resources and transforming people, and contribute to an upward spiral of positive emotions. Taking into account the underlying psychological mechanisms of the impact of music on the emotional states it will be possible to use it to improve emotional area and other aspects of the personal sphere, as Chang et al., [ 10 ] maintain. Therefore, music education is an important resource to improve the emotional development of students.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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We should like to express our gratitude to the Valencia University student teachers for their disinterested and valuable contribution to this study.

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José Salvador Blasco-Magraner, Pablo Marín-Liébana & Ana María Botella-Nicolás

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Blasco-Magraner, J.S., Bernabé-Valero, G., Marín-Liébana, P. et al. Changing positive and negative affects through music experiences: a study with university students. BMC Psychol 11 , 76 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-023-01110-9

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Pros & Cons Of Listening To Music While Writing An Essay

The effect of background music on thought processes is somehow more complicated than we previously thought. Pros and cons of music in essay writing in researches are not about “melodies in general” or “writing in general”, but works of particular styles that help (or prevent) solving certain tasks.

• Pros of writing with music

Many students and schoolchildren listen to melodies while studying even in class. There is nothing wrong with this because all the people are different and background music can really help someone concentrate, especially if he does a monotonous job. While looking for free essays or writing your paper assignment, students may experience stress and calm melodies can reduce it or even remove it. Also, favorite songs in the background can improve the student’s mood and concentration. Moreover, sometimes students can associate a certain moment of study with a song and memorize the necessary material through melodies.

• Cons of listening to music while studying

Unfortunately, despite all the positive aspects, scientists have proved that music is more distracting than helps in learning. Students who listen to songs while doing reading or writing assignments tend to be less effective and walk away, absorbing less information. Loud or too fast melodies can interfere with your concentration during the performance of tasks. Above we mentioned a trick when a material is remembered when associated with a song. The disadvantage of this method is that in the exam you are unlikely to be given the opportunity to listen to music in order to remember something.

• MYTH. Music helps you concentrate on work

Truth. Recent studies have shown that music can have a beneficial effect on creativity. In particular, Simone M. Ritter and Sam Ferguson of the University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands have shown in their recent work that people who perform creative tasks while listening to classical music are more productive than their counterparts who work in silence.

At the same time, several decades have been spent researching how sound affects work productivity. A review of laboratory research on this topic shows that there is a phenomenon called “inappropriate sound effect”. Basically, this effect means that the performance gets worse when the task is performed in the presence of background sound. This effect is more pronounced when not only instrumental music but also human language sounds in the background.

Scientists note that this effect is manifested when performing complex tasks that require maximum concentration. In addition, the nature of the background sounds matters. If they do not meet the preferences of the person, the productivity drops significantly.

• Can music motivate you to write?

Music can definitely influence the mood by exacerbating the bad and maintaining the good, it can improve or worsen the mood and it all depends on certain situations. During studies, sometimes it is too lazy to do something. Especially with regard to paperwork. But listening to your favorite songs can cheer you up and motivate you to work, do research work and write an essay. This is true because a person’s mood can depend on weather and melodies. Concentrating on working on your essay, you don’t have to listen to melodies, but it can definitely motivate you to find the materials you need to work and at least read them. Then it all depends on how you prefer to continue to work. Perhaps you are from the tech who writes scientific papers to music, or maybe the one who works only in silence. The main thing is that melodies can push you to the beginning of work!

Conclusion:

Playing music in the background helps or hinders performance, depending on the person’s task and the type of melodies. Only understanding these relationships will help people increase their level of productivity. If the task requires a creative approach, listening to your favorite melodies can improve performance. If the job requires a lot of information, it’s better to work with or without music at all, or with background music.

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Music and health

Music is a fundamental attribute of the human species. Virtually all cultures, from the most primitive to the most advanced, make music. It's been true through history, and it's true throughout an individual's lifespan. In tune or not, we humans sing and hum; in time or not, we clap and sway; in step or not, we dance and bounce.

The human brain and nervous system are hard-wired to distinguish music from noise and to respond to rhythm and repetition, tones, and tunes. Is this a biologic accident, or does it serve a purpose? It's not possible to say. Still, a varied group of studies suggests that music may enhance human health and performance.

Music and the brain

Like any sound, music arrives at the ear in the form of sound waves. The external ear collects sound waves, and the ear canal funnels them to the eardrum. As the waves strike the eardrum, they cause it to vibrate. The vibrations are relayed along the chain of tiny bones in the middle ear until they reach the third bone, the stapes, which connects to the cochlea.

The cochlea is a busy little world of its own. It is filled with fluid that surrounds some 10,000 to 15,000 tiny hair cells, or cilia. Vibrations of the stapes send fluid waves through the spiral-shaped cochlea. The fluid waves produce swaying movements of the hair cells. In turn, these cells release chemical neurotransmitters that activate the auditory nerve, sending miniature electric currents to the auditory cortex in the temporal lobe of the brain.

From there, things get even more complicated. Studies using MRI and positron emission tomography (PET) scans suggest that nerve networks in different parts of the brain bear primary responsibility for decoding and interpreting various properties of music. For example, a small area in the right temporal lobe is essential to perceive pitch, which forms the basis of melody (patterns of pitch over time), chords (several pitches that sound at the same time), and harmony (two or more melodies at the same time). Another nearby center is responsible for decoding timbre, the quality that allows the brain to distinguish between different instruments that are playing the same note. A different part of the brain, the cerebellum, processes rhythm, and the frontal lobes interpret the emotional content of music. And music that's powerful enough to be "spine-tingling" can light up the brain's "reward center," much like pleasurable stimuli ranging from alcohol to chocolate.

Although every healthy human brain can perform all the complex tasks needed to perceive music, musicians' brains are, so to speak, more finely attuned to these tasks. At the other end of the spectrum, patients with brain damage may display remarkable defects in musicality; the noted neurologist and writer Dr. Oliver Sacks discusses many fascinating varieties of amusia in his book Musicophilia .

The neurobiology of music is a highly specialized field. But music also has major effects on many aspects of health, ranging from memory and mood to cardiovascular function and athletic performance.

Music and the mind

The most highly publicized mental influence of music is the "Mozart effect." Struck by the observation that many musicians have unusual mathematical ability, researchers at the University of California, Irvine, investigated how listening to music affects cognitive function in general, and spatial-temporal reasoning in particular. In their first study, they administered standard IQ test questions to three groups of college students, comparing those who had spent 10 minutes listening to a Mozart piano sonata with a group that had been listening to a relaxation tape and one that had been waiting in silence. Mozart was the winner, consistently boosting test scores. Next, the investigators checked to see if the effect was specific to classical music or if any form of music would enhance mental performance. They compared Mozart's music with repetitive music by Philip Glass; again, Mozart seemed to help, improving spatial reasoning as measured by complex paper cutting and folding tasks and short-term memory as measured by a 16-item test.

How might music enhance cognitive performance? It's not clear, but the researchers speculated that listening to music helps organize the firing of nerve cells in the right half of the cerebral cortex, the part of the brain responsible for higher functions. According to this construct, music — or at least some forms of music — acts as an "exercise" that warms up selected brain cells, allowing them to process information more efficiently. It's an interesting theory, but before you rush out to stock up on recordings of Mozart's music, you should know that even in the original research, the "Mozart effect" was modest (8 to 9 IQ points) and temporary (15 minutes). And in reviewing 16 studies of Mozart's music and human cognitive function, a Harvard psychologist concluded that the effect was even smaller, amounting to no more than 2.1 IQ points. It's a sour note, but it's hardly a requiem for the theory that music may boost cognitive function. In fact, the divergent results should serve as a prelude to additional research. And even if listening to music turns out to have little long-term effect on cognition, a 2010 review reported that learning to play an instrument may enhance the brain's ability to master tasks involving language skills, memory, and attention.

Music and stress

In every era of human history and in every society around the globe, music has allowed people to express their feelings and communicate with others. More than simply expressing emotions, music can alter them; as British dramatist William Congreve put it in 1697, "Music has charms to soothe a savage breast."

Few things are more stressful than illness and surgery. Can music reduce stress in these difficult circumstances? Several trials show it can.

A study from New York examined how music affects surgical patients. Forty cataract patients with an average age of 74 volunteered for the trial. Half were randomly assigned to receive ordinary care; the others got the same care but also listened to music of their choice through headphones before, during, and immediately after the operations. Before surgery, the patients in both groups had similar blood pressures; a week before the operations, the average was 129/82 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg). The average blood pressure in both groups rose to 159/92 just before surgery, and in both groups, the average heart rate jumped by 17 beats per minute. But the patients surrounded by silence remained hypertensive throughout the operation, while the pressures of those who listened to music came down rapidly and stayed down into the recovery room, where the average reduction was an impressive 35 mm Hg systolic (the top number) and 24 mm Hg diastolic (the bottom number). The listeners also reported that they felt calmer and better during the operation. The ophthalmologic surgeons had no problems communicating with their patients over the sound of the music, but the researchers didn't ask the doctors if their patients' improved blood pressure readings made them more relaxed as they did their work. Earlier research, though, found that surgeons showed fewer signs of stress and demonstrated improved performance while listening to self-selected music.

A study of 80 patients undergoing urologic surgery under spinal anesthesia found that music can decrease the need for supplementary intravenous sedation. In this trial, patients were able to control the amount of sedative they received during their operation. Patients who were randomly assigned to listen to music needed less calming medication than those assigned to listen to white noise or to the chatter and clatter of the operating room itself.

In the cataract and urologic surgery studies, the patients were awake during their operations. But a study of 10 critically ill postoperative patients reported that music can reduce the stress response even when patients are not conscious. All the patients were receiving the powerful intravenous sedative propofol, so they could be maintained on breathing machines in the intensive care unit (ICU). Half the patients were randomly assigned to wear headphones that played slow movements from Mozart piano sonatas, while the other half wore headphones that did not play music. Nurses who didn't know which patients were hearing music reported that those who heard music required significantly less propofol to maintain deep sedation than those patients wearing silent headphones. The music recipients also had lower blood pressures and heart rates as well as lower blood levels of the stress hormone adrenaline and the inflammation-promoting cytokine interleukin-6.

Neither of the operating room studies specified the type of music used, while the ICU trial used slow classical music. An Italian study of 24 healthy volunteers, half of whom were proficient musicians, found that tempo is important. Slow or meditative music produced a relaxing effect; faster tempos produced arousal, but immediately after the upbeat music stopped, the subjects' heart rates and blood pressures came down to below their usual levels, indicating relaxation.

Music and mood

Soothing jangled nerves is one thing; raising sagging spirits, another. Bright, cheerful music can make people of all ages feel happy, energetic, and alert, and music may even has a role in lifting the mood of people with depressive illnesses. Bach may never replace Prozac, but when it comes to depression, even a little help strikes a welcome chord.

Music and movement

Falling is a serious medical problem, particularly for people over 65; in fact, one of every three senior citizens suffers at least one fall during the course of a year. Can music help? An older study says it can. The subjects were 134 men and women 65 and older who were at risk of falling but who were free of major neurologic and orthopedic problems that would limit walking. Half the volunteers were randomly assigned to a program that trained them to walk and perform various movements in time to music, while the other people continued their usual activities. At the end of six months, the "dancers" exhibited better gait and balance than their peers — and they also experienced 54% fewer falls. Similar programs of movement to music appear to improve the mobility of patients with Parkinson's disease.

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Disadvantages Of Listening To Music

Americans operating automobiles undergo the typical way of life, but sitting behind a wheel can often start to feel monotonous. Motorcycles, however, seem exotic and provide a rejuvenating change in tempo. In order to evade colorless life, the populace may listen to music in order to link them into another reality. While listening to music seems like an entertaining activity, playing it proves to dominate. Musicians playing guitars mentally, leave reality and enter a dreamlike dimension of spine-tingling rhythm and melody. With both, traveling on a motorcycle or strumming the chords of a guitar , a beginner must assimilate what they have learned to reach excellence. So whether its a musician playing melodic tunes on guitar or a motorcyclist cruising on down a highway, both prove ways to spark a thrill in a rather boring life or ways to improve skills in order to reach certain merit. Motorcyclists experience immense exhilaration when gliding down long streets or bumping up and down dusty hills. Trained motorcyclists can perform breathtaking tricks that amaze audiences and make them feel accomplished. These perks make motorcycling so amusing for not only rides but fans. For instance, when motorcyclists cruise down empty roads, they can speed up to over 70mph and weave in and out of lanes while doing impressive wheelies to entertain themselves. Likewise, a musician playing guitar experiences the thrill of performing. Feeling anxious before going on stage to wow an audience,

Critically evaluate Pinker's claim that music is auditory cheesecake

Miller (2000) interprets Music as an aesthetic display and indicator for fitness. Musical activities such as “dancing” represents health, “voice control...self confidence for status”, “Rhythmic” engagement shows ability to identify patterns and “melodic creativity” which assists initiation for social communication(Miller 2000, p.10). This handicapping, sexual trait may be useful for reproductive success but attempting to gain excessive aesthetic display can lead to dire consequences. Jimi Hendrix, famous guitarist, died at 27 years from drug overdose which he used to “spark his musical imagination” (Miller, 2000, p.2). Hendrix’s fatal actions can be explained by the neural overlap between effects of drug and music, making music a possible threat to survival(Blood and

Descriptive Essay About Eddie Van Halen

From the moment I heard the majestic scream of Eddie Van Halen’s guitar, I knew I had to learn how to play guitar. I was but only a listener at the time, but the passion of a musician budded within me, and locked my vicarious attention on every note. The more I listened to Van Halen, the more I wanted to stop being a listener, and start being a creator. It was like some insane urge came over me every time I listened to them - telling me to create something. It was a musical high.

Whale You Ever Had An Indian Taco Essay

July in the city of Toronto is a scorchingly hot month and the need to escape to a lake or forest is at the forefront of most individuals’ agendas. Only then are they content amidst thoughts of campfires and mosquitos. It is music to their ears. For permanent cottage country residents like myself summer brings months of ruined rhythms. My village hums as thousands of tourists ascend with the same need to escape. However, where does one go to find musical inspiration in chaos? And if one finds it, is it learned or innate? This essay will examine how we are conditioned to believe our ability to listen and perform music can only exist within certain parameters; how Blacking’s hypothesis “music is innate”( ) applies to those untutored; and how both lured an entire village to love Indian Taco’s.

Music Is Innate Or Innate?

July in the city of Toronto is a scorchingly hot month and the need to escape to a lake or forest is at the forefront of most individuals’ agendas. Only then are they content amidst thoughts of campfires and mosquitos. It is music to their ears. For permanent cottage country residents like myself summer brings months of ruined rhythms. My village hums as thousands of tourists ascend with the same need to escape. However, where does one go to find musical inspiration in chaos? And if one finds it, is it learned or innate? This essay will examine how we are conditioned to believe our ability to listen and perform music can only exist within certain parameteres; how Blacking’s hypothesis “music is innate”( ) applies to those untutored; and how both lured an entire village to love Indian Taco’s.

Popular Culture And Learning Analysis

It’s proven that when teachers understand and know the type of music that their students enjoy, more learning can commence. The author mentions that video games such as Guitar Hero and

Comparing Folk Rock And Baroque Music

Throughout mankind’s history, music has been used as a vital form of human expression. Whether capturing and conveying feelings of sorrow, rage, triumph, or love, its primary purpose has always been enthralling and resonating with its listeners. Over the years, the emergence of new technologies and musical tastes has brought the world rock and roll, pop, folk, country, techno, and many other widely varied styles of music, each of which presents its own meaning and

On The Road

The road is exciting until you miss your bed and desire to have more then one option of what to wear every morning. The difference for musicians is that the road comes across different to them.

Press Play Research Paper

From the moment we wake up, our minds press play and our mornings begin. Everyone has their own procedure throughout the day, but one thing may stand out in regular activities: Some may sing, hum, or even listen to music in the shower, or just in general. One might also brush their teeth while singing “that song” stuck in their head, or possibly even their ABC’s, as they should always brush their teeth for at least 2 minutes. Perhaps a television is turned on, and like a fishing rod, snags this individual to the catchy theme song of a favorite show. And then, there is the most cliche custom that most everyone turns to when stepping into a vehicle, the radio. Music can be found or expressed in many aspects of life. From the beat of our hearts to the beat of the song, music is what life sounds like.

Benefit Of Listening To Music

Ever since I began high school, music has been an important part of my life. Every day, on the way to and from school, I could be seen on the bus relaxing and listening to music. At first, I listened to music because it seemed like the most convenient way for me to pass time and stay entertained on my ride. However, as I got older and became more accustomed to my schedule, what I realized was that listening to music every day had a larger effect on my mental health then I thought. I realized that for me, listening to music had a meditative effect, and when I would not listen to my music, I would feel more stressed out and anxious then when I did. Therefore, I was not one bit surprised when I learned of numerous studies that have proven that listening to music every day is not only a leisure activity, but has serious effects on the brain that anyone could benefit from. I was able to have a first-hand experience of benefiting from music as a meditative tool, and hope that other students are able to realize that they should not just be listening to music for leisure, but should be making listening to music a part of their daily schedule because of the health benefits it has.

Music And Its Effects On Children

Parents also serve as a blockade when it comes to the subject of music. Parents are very cautious and get very defensive of what their children listen to. Parents block children from hearing the truth or prevent their child from seeing how an artist expresses themselves, because of a few raunchy lyrics and profanity? I often listen to music on my iPhone, but since Apple launched its Apple Music project, my music only plays in the edited or clean version, which is very annoying. I am a huge Future fan and on his recent album, “Dirty Sprite 2,” it’s the curse words that really build the song. The profanity really makes the album sizzle and paints the image of and blends the album together so perfectly. Music is a form or art, who are you to

Negative Effects Of Music Downloading

While some may argue that downloading music illegally increases an artist’s popularity by exposure, doing so greatly harms the artist and the dedication they put into producing their music. Supporters of free music downloading claim that online sites only increase the popularity of an artist’s music by giving them more exposure to a bigger audience. John Dino, a supporter of free music downloading states in his speech, “sites, such as Napster are helping artists’ music to be spread around worldwide, while simultaneously granting listeners a simple way to access music” (Theft in Music). These free online sites give listeners a way to test an artist’s music to see if they are truly interested in buying. By doing so, it saves the listeners from buying music they could potentially not like, and it saves the artist from gaining false music purchases that listeners could actually not be listening to. This process can limit an artist’s fans to only listeners that are interested in the artist’s music and fans that generally want to support and endorse the artist by buying their merchandise or going to their concerts. In turn, the artist’s sales should profit as more people are listening to the artist’s music and buying their products which allows them to become more known worldwide as they are getting more easily recognized on a global scale. Regardless, even if listeners find that they are not interested in the artist’s music and therefore do not purchase their music, the music industry can still benefit from the wide-access other artists receive. According to a speech done by Ariana Torres, she summarizes that the music industry still makes money despite loss from free music downloading that the industry can then turn into more contracts (“Downloading Music”). The music industry is highly flexible mainly because they focus solely on popular artists, or emerging artists that could potentially make a hit and gain the industry profit from their sales. Either way, the industry still makes money because of the people listening to different artists’ music. The chance of a listener listening to only one artist is highly unlikely, so that means the listener has to be listening to two or more artists’ music. This means that

The Effects Of Listening On Different Types Of Music

Effects of listening to different types of music one week prior to midterm exam on student’s result in a randomized classroom clinical trial

The Importance Of Listening To Music

It is queer how human vocal chords can influence sounds. Another queer aspect is that human brains distinguishes many noises as a pattern of rhythms to identify as music. Music affects the brain in many ways. It can help the brain focus and stay concentrated, improve your mood, and motivate people. Listening to music while studying is a study habit for students of all ages. Many students don’t know whether they should listen to music while they are studying. Listening to music may be helpful to their academic achievement, but it may also be harmful to their academic achievement.

Negative Effects Of Music

Music can impact the lives of people drastically. Listening to music can affect your mood. Good music and a nice long night drive can make the experience better. Sad music has an opposite effect, it brings people down. For example a song that brings joy and happiness would be “ Don’t Threaten Me with a Good Time” by Panic! at the Disco. A sentimental song would be “ See You Again” by Wiz Khalifa. Lastly “The Memory” by Mayday Parade would make anyone sad or a bit down.

The Negative Effects Of Music In Music

A lot of people around the world experience chronic or severe pain. Twenty-five million adults in America alone have experienced on going pain in the past few months and the effects can be numerous (Bushak). Chronic pain like this can cause discomfort, frustration and fatigue as well as having other effects on the overall health and happiness of a person. Some people turn to medicine, but this does not always work; therefore, others turn to different, more holistic, approaches. Many people assume that prescribed medication will always work but that is just not the case when each body is different and reacts to medication in different ways. Music is one form of pain management which falls in between the two categories. While music is not a typical form of medicine used to treat chronic pain or pain after surgery, it does have backing in science. Numerous trials have been done to test the effects of music when people experiencing chronic, severe, or surgical pain are exposed to different genres of music. In many cases, music has a very positive, soothing effect on physical pain, making that person feel significantly better.

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The harmful side of music: Understanding the effects of rumination on adolescent mental health

• Category: General Health , Mental Health , Parenting , Keep Kids Well
• Posted on: Apr 12, 2023
• Written By: Roger Botello, MMT, MT-BC, Board Certified Music Therapist

The power of music is undeniable, as it can evoke emotions and transport us to different places and times. However, research shows that music can also induce harmful effects, particularly when it comes to rumination. When a person dwells on negative thinking or feelings, it can contribute to the development of depression and anxiety or worsen existing conditions. This is especially concerning for teenagers, as music can be a powerful tool for self-expression and emotional regulation. As parents, it is important to have conversations with our children about the effects of music on mood and cognition, and to help them understand how to avoid using music to reinforce unhealthy coping strategies.

Rumination, or repetitive thinking or dwelling on negative feelings, can occur when a teen is listening to sad music to induce rumination and therefore experiences affective harm via the worsening of mood. In addition, researchers find that music-induced harm can occur when people listen to self-identified sad music during moments of psychological distress. Among teens, this can be potentially harmful when music is used with the intention of attaining feelings of support, but instead, the music intensifies symptoms which can result in behaviors that are unhealthy or harmful. Researchers also find that it is important to understand the influence of peer subcultures and the potential influence of preferred music on self-injurious behavior.

Other factors to consider include the role of a musical genre in constructing an adolescent’s personal, social, group and cultural identity. This is an important factor for parents to consider as some genres of music are associated with substance and alcohol abuse, opposing authority and rebelliousness along with violent behavior, delinquency, and impulsive and violent traits. According to Miranda, social schema and stereotypes about fans of different musical genres can influence intergroup dynamics and can influence seven major areas of development: aesthetics, identity, socialization, emotional regulation and coping, personality and motivation, gender roles, and positive youth-development.

Rumination is assessed using multi-item questionnaires such as the Response Styles Questionnaire (RSQ). Studies indicate that high rumination scores predict higher future depressive symptoms and major depressive episodes in child and adolescent samples. In 2022, researchers studied the eight musical emotion mechanisms highlighted in the Brain Stem: Reflex, Rhythmic Entrainment, Evaluative Conditioning, Contagion, Visual Imagery, Episodic Memory, Musical Expectancy, and Aesthetic Judgement (BRECVEMA). In a sample of young adults, according to Larwood, it showed an increase in sadness among those who listened to a self-nominated sad song. Moreover, individuals with higher levels of rumination had greater increases in sadness and were more likely to experience musical entrainment and select songs with associated memories while experiencing emotional contagion. This means that adolescents who are experiencing symptoms of depression may intentionally select music that can induce rumination which can exacerbate mood symptoms.

So, as a parent, what can you do if you are concerned?

It is important for parents to have conversations with their children about the effects music can have on mood and cognition as social identification with a particular musical genre becomes prevalent in adolescence. Help your children practice listening to different musical styles. It might be helpful for parents to pay attention to their growing adolescent’s preferred musical artist(s) and examine who influenced that artist. While learning about a given artist’s musical influences, you may come to discover various alternatives to share while learning more about different musical subcultures. By engaging children in a discussion about music: its feeling, its content, imagery, and influences, parents can teach their them how to be more aware of the effects of music and to understand how music can elicit rumination.

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6 Advantages and Disadvantages of Listening to Music While Studying

The music is one of the most inspiring and comprehensive arts. Since the beginning of history, man has had the drive to communicate his ideas and feelings through song and dance. And as for dancing, you will dance for joy if your assignment will write a service like Domyessay .

Nowadays, even employers from companies like BidForWriting , in order to do their work more efficiently, listen to music that helps them stay focused. Today there are hundreds of genres and millions of artists of all kinds. From popular and folk to classical, pop, rock, and jazz.

Regardless of your favorite, various research shows why you should listen while you study.

Here are the reasons why it benefits learning, but we also tell you how to listen in properly while studying and a few disadvantages.

1. It helps you memories better

When we listen to music, our brain releases a chemical called dopamine, also known as the “happiness hormone.” And what does it have to do with learning? Memories have been shown to always contain an emotional element, so when you study listening to music, knowledge is more likely to be grounded in your brain.

2. Strengthen your cognitive ability

Following in line with the previous point, recent research determined that people who learn to play a musical instrument have better results in variables such as vocabulary, critical reasoning ability, and fine motor skills. So you should also learn to play it and not just listen to it!

3. Stimulates concentration

It is known that many surgeons, when operating, listen to their favorite songs as a way to block any distraction. Various studies have shown that listening to calm and harmonious music while doing intellectual tasks that require a lot of concentration is a highly effective method.

What genre should you listen to?

Relaxing music for studying is the best. Styles like classical or background, chill out or movie soundtracks come into play here.

Better instrumental than with lyrics

Let’s not fool ourselves. If we put on a familiar song, the kind that continually plays on bars and on TV, we won’t be able to keep our attention on the sheets in front of us and humming will engulf the room sooner than later. Avoid such distractions and make sure your playlist is made up of instrumental themes, it’s the best music to study and focus on.

Listen to it to perform mechanical tasks

Relaxing music to study is a good companion to the most mechanical, repetitive, and monotonous memory tasks. But we must be aware that meaningful learning, the truly resulting from the understanding of the contents and subsequent appropriation of knowledge, is best done in a silent environment.

Play it if there is too much noise around

Linking the previous idea, before the impossibility of silence, relaxing music is better to study than noise. Our house or library is not always quiet places, so put on music and get a stable and unalterable environment.

Control the volume, you’re not partying – It should be at a medium-low volume. Forget about full volume.

Use long playlists – If the playlist is constantly stopped and you have to interrupt what you are doing to change to another one, don’t worry. Think about the time you usually study without break and make a list of this duration so that it ends when you go to take a break. The average is in 2 or 3 hours. Or just play some radio station, like ChilloutRadio , and let them choose for you appropriate music.

Disadvantages

4. multitasking.

Multitasking is a term that has its origin in the field of computing. By multitasking, we understand the process by which two or more tasks or processes are performed at the same time.

The term multitasking is applied in different aspects related to productivity and performance and, unfortunately, it is becoming a quality highly valued in the academic and business world.

But people with multitasking behavior lose concentration as the brain clearly conflicts. In this sense and in relation to the topic of this article, listening to music while studying is detrimental because the brain must be divided into two actions.

On the one hand, the brain works on aspects of the study, while on the other, it listens to songs. The effect is just the opposite of what people think. Listening while studying does not help us relax or concentrate, on the contrary, it increases our stress and decreases our attention.

5. Productivity

In relation to the first reason is that by doing two tasks simultaneously you lose time and productivity.

Many people find it that if it is silence around them, they are achieving much better results. But that is probably on the personal level, everyone has different preferences. The music is still noise and all noise that it causes is an alteration in the brain. For a long time, when doing an intellectual activity, it makes it extremely difficult for me to do any type of task related to work.

Today many of the people who listen to music do so through electronic devices such as players, mobile devices, tablets…

They store a huge amount of data on these devices. This music, which will be the one chosen to listen to while studying, becomes continuous decision-making. I explain. By having so much musical information on our device, we waste a remarkable amount of time selecting those songs that we like. What this selection process does is to continuously interrupt the pace of study and directly affects the concentration required by a task such as studying.

The problem of these devices is also linked to our tastes, because while we listen to music, the songs evoke some kind of feeling, memory, taste, aversion, etc.

All these blocks and interrupts the study again and makes the time we dedicate to study increase considerably. When talking about the expression of listening to music, you have to make a clear differentiation.

Conclusion:

Music has fundamental benefits for the brain . Recent research indicates that learning to play an instrument in childhood manages to prosper a person’s cognitive performance in each and every aspect. In addition to this, it has also been proven that it compensates for the cognitive loss of aging.

This is all because music produces neural connections that improve other aspects of communication.

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Benefits Of Music Essay

Music can take the form of many things. It can be a form of art, pleasure or entertainment. Music can also be a form of medicine that can benefit mind and body. Music can positively affect your health and physical development. Music is a complex activity that involves the use of your entire brain. Music may have several positive benefits for the brain . Be wary though, not all kinds of music may positively affect your health. Some kinds of music may be a form of distraction for you. Classical music, most of the time, can positively affect people. Music can be a source of pain relief. When you listen to music, the body releases endorphins to reduce the pain. Relaxing music can slow down your heartbeat. It can also help with your breathing. …show more content…

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Therefore, I am standing here to hopefully persuade all of you regarding the benefits of music that you could experience in your life. Basically, there are many benefits of listening to music but today, I am going to focus only three significant reasons of how music can be a healer in our life. First and foremost, it may seem typical but music really can make you happy. Besides, music also can enhance your performance during a workout. Last but not least, music can be a factor to improve sleep quality.

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Related topics.

• Music therapy

Advantages and disadvantages of traditional music

Due to contemporary lifestyles and technological improvements, global music has become more and more well-liked in recent years. As a result, traditional music is progressively losing its significance. Traditional music embodies a society's history, values, and customs, and its advantage cannot be denied. This essay will discuss both these points of view and argue in favor of the latter.

On the one hand, there are several problems with traditional music nowadays. Originally, traditional music was transmitted orally, and many songs were never properly recorded or written down. Because of this, many of these songs have been lost to the ages throughout time, depriving future generations of the music. Since so many traditional songs haven't been recorded, locating and displaying them might be challenging. Secondly, because traditional music does not have copyright protection, modern musicians and others can sample and utilize the music without having to pay royalties. The artists who composed the original music were frequently not given credit for it, and as a result, their works were not recognized.

On the other hand, a nation's traditions and customs are represented by its traditional music. There are historical, societal, and even theological meanings hidden behind the music. Traditional music can also help people connect with their ancestors' cultural legacies. Therefore, it is essential and carries a nation's native customs and dignity. As a result, we must maintain our own traditional music, as it can inform us about our ancestors' history and lives, as well as who we are. For instance, several Indian holidays, such as Onam and Deepavali, have their own songs. Certain songs are exclusively played at these events.

Personally, I think that when anything is strongly tied to their heritage and culture, including music, people pay greater attention and express a higher degree of interest.

In summary, music is an essential part of our lives that both supports and heals our emotional states. The value of traditional music may be observed in its ability to preserve and transmit cultural traditions through generations.

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Grammar and spelling errors: Line 4, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace Suggestion: ... and argue in favor of the latter. On the one hand, there are several probl... ^^^^ Line 4, column 353, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING Message: Possible spelling mistake found Suggestion: haven't ... music. Since so many traditional songs havent been recorded, locating and displaying ... ^^^^^^ Line 7, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace Suggestion: ..., their works were not recognized. On the other hand, a nations traditions ... ^^^^ Line 7, column 312, Rule ID: A_PLURAL[1] Message: Don't use indefinite articles with plural words. Did you mean 'a nation' or simply 'nations'? Suggestion: a nation; nations ... Therefore, it is essential and carries a nations native customs and dignity. As a result... ^^^^^^^^^ Line 10, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace Suggestion: ...xclusively played at these events. Personally, I think that when anything i... ^^^^ Line 13, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace Suggestion: ...ress a higher degree of interest. In summary, music is an essential part o... ^^^^

Transition Words or Phrases used: also, if, may, second, secondly, so, therefore, well, for instance, i think, in summary, such as, as a result, as well as, on the other hand

Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments

Performance on Part of Speech: To be verbs : 18.0 13.1623246493 137% => OK Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 7.85571142285 102% => OK Conjunction : 21.0 10.4138276553 202% => Less conjunction wanted Relative clauses : 5.0 7.30460921844 68% => More relative clauses wanted. Pronoun: 27.0 24.0651302605 112% => OK Preposition: 30.0 41.998997996 71% => OK Nominalization: 4.0 8.3376753507 48% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.

Performance on vocabulary words: No of characters: 1834.0 1615.20841683 114% => OK No of words: 334.0 315.596192385 106% => OK Chars per words: 5.49101796407 5.12529762239 107% => OK Fourth root words length: 4.27500489853 4.20363070211 102% => OK Word Length SD: 2.88778003815 2.80592935109 103% => OK Unique words: 201.0 176.041082164 114% => OK Unique words percentage: 0.601796407186 0.561755894193 107% => OK syllable_count: 574.2 506.74238477 113% => OK avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.60771543086 106% => OK

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Essay readability: automated_readability_index: 12.8 13.0946893788 98% => OK flesch_reading_ease: 46.78 50.2224549098 93% => OK smog_index: 8.8 7.44779559118 118% => OK flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 11.3001002004 95% => OK coleman_liau_index: 14.27 12.4159519038 115% => OK dale_chall_readability_score: 9.25 8.58950901804 108% => OK difficult_words: 102.0 78.4519038076 130% => OK linsear_write_formula: 7.5 9.78957915832 77% => OK gunning_fog: 8.4 10.1190380762 83% => OK text_standard: 9.0 10.7795591182 83% => OK What are above readability scores?

--------------------- Rates: 84.2696629213 out of 100 Scores by essay e-grader: 7.5 Out of 9 --------------------- Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.

The Evanstonian

Pros and cons of music festivals.

Margo Levitan , Entertainment Editor August 22, 2016

Music festivals.

Although this term is widely known, the definition changes according to those you ask. For some, it is a magical experience, providing access to a wide range of musicians all in one place, a chance to reconnect with friends. For others, however, it means large crowds, searing temperatures, and trouble.

“There is a lot of exhaustion after attending a music festival. At the end of the day, all you want to do is lie in bed,” says senior Daisy Chaudruc.

This seems to be a general consensus. Due to the large crowds, loud music and general party atmosphere, most people that attend are completely exhausted by the end of it all. It is a nightmare for people with claustrophobia due to the sheer amount of individuals that pack together to view their favorite musician. Fortunately, there is a lot of variety and choice when it comes to music festivals, especially in Chicago.

Lollapalooza is one of the largest annual music festivals students attend, focusing on alternative rock, electronic dance music and hip hop. There is also Pitchfork, which features the same basics as Lollapalooza but branches off into punk, alternative rock and jazz, and Country Thunder, which offers country music.

For Lollapalooza, one day of tickets is at least 120 dollars while Pitchfork is priced only at 65 dollars per day and Country Thunder at 130 for all three days of the festival. It is often difficult to buy tickets right off of the website before they sell out, forcing people to turn to outside resellers for high prices.

“It was so crazy when the tickets came out for Lollapalooza, and they were just so expensive,” says Hannah Stein, sophomore. “That’s why I chose not to attend this year.”

Despite these high prices, the music festival scene still has its benefits.

“Being with all of your friends and seeing music together is the best part,” says Chaudruc. “It is sometimes difficult to organize a group to meet at a concert, but music festivals provide that in one place.”

They allow for individuals to see a wide variety of favorite artists in just one day, bringing in talent from around the globe. With multiple summer festivals as options, there is music there that would satisfy all genres. Some argue that suffering through the tight crowd is just part of the experience, making new friends in the process, while others say that the high prices are totally worth a jam packed weekend of fun.

“No matter how packed or expensive music festivals are, the pros outweigh the cons,” says Eddie Liccardo, senior. “It’s all worth it at the end.”

        Although they are not for the faint of heart or a small budget, they provide individuals with a great weekend filled with fun, friends, and great and talented artists. Overall, it all comes down to the music taste of the beholder.

Your donation will support the student journalists of the Evanstonian. We are planning a big trip to the Journalism Educators Association conference in Philadelphia in November 2023, and any support will go towards making that trip a reality. Contributions will appear as a charge from SNOSite. Donations are NOT tax-deductible.

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How Listening to Music Can Have Psychological Benefits

Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

Steven Gans, MD is board-certified in psychiatry and is an active supervisor, teacher, and mentor at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Listening to music can be entertaining, and some research suggests that it might even make you healthier. Music can be a source of pleasure and contentment, but there are many other psychological benefits as well. Music can relax the mind, energize the body, and even help people better manage pain.

The notion that music can influence your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors probably does not come as much of a surprise. If you've ever felt pumped up while listening to your favorite fast-paced rock anthem or been moved to tears by a tender live performance, then you easily understand the power of music to impact moods and even inspire action.

The psychological effects of music can be powerful and wide-ranging. Music therapy is an intervention sometimes used to promote emotional health, help patients cope with stress, and boost psychological well-being. Some research even suggests that your taste in music can provide insight into different aspects of your personality .

Music Can Improve Cognitive Performance

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Research suggests that background music, or music that is played while the listener is primarily focused on another activity, can improve performance on cognitive tasks in older adults. One study found that playing more upbeat music led to improvements in processing speed, while both upbeat and downbeat music led to benefits in memory.

So the next time you are working on a task, consider turning on a little music in the background if you are looking for a boost in your mental performance. Consider choosing instrumental tracks rather than those with complex lyrics, which might end up being more distracting.

Music Can Reduce Stress

It has long been suggested that music can help reduce or manage stress. Consider the trend centered on meditative music created to soothe the mind and inducing relaxation.

Fortunately, this is one trend supported by research. Listening to music can be an effective way to cope with stress.

In one 2013 study, participants took part in one of three conditions before being exposed to a stressor and then taking a psychosocial stress test. Some participants listened to relaxing music, others listened to the sound of rippling water, and the rest received no auditory stimulation.

The results suggested that listening to music had an impact on the human stress response , particularly the autonomic nervous system . Those who had listened to music tended to recover more quickly following a stressor.

Music Can Help You Eat Less

One of the most surprising psychological benefits of music is that it might be a helpful weight-loss tool. If you are trying to lose weight, listening to mellow music and dimming the lights might help you achieve your goals .

According to one study, people who ate at low-lit restaurants where soft music was played consumed 18% less food than those who ate in other restaurants.  

The researchers suggest that music and lighting help create a more relaxed setting. Since the participants were more relaxed and comfortable, they may have consumed their food more slowly and have been more aware of when they began to feel full.

You might try putting this into practice by playing soft music at home while you eat dinner. By creating a relaxing setting, you may be more likely to eat slowly and, therefore, feel fuller sooner.

Music Can Improve Your Memory

Lots of students enjoy listening to music while they study, but is that such a great idea? Some feel like listening to their favorite music as they study improves memory , while others contend that it simply serves as a pleasant distraction.

Research suggests that it may help. But it depends upon a variety of factors, including the type of music, the listener's enjoyment of that music, and even how musically well-trained the listener may be.

In one study, musically naive students learned better when listening to positive music, possibly because these songs elicited more positive emotions without interfering with memory formation.

However, musically trained students tended to perform better on learning tests when they listened to neutral music, possibly because this type of music was less distracting and easier to ignore. If you tend to find yourself distracted by music, you may be better off learning in silence or with neutral tracks playing in the background.

Another study found that participants learning a new language showed improvement in their knowledge and abilities when they practiced singing new words and phrases versus just regular speaking or rhythmic speaking.  

Music Can Help Manage Pain

Research has shown that music can be very helpful in the management of pain. One study of fibromyalgia patients found that those who listened to music for just one hour a day experienced a significant reduction in pain compared to those in a control group .  

At the end of the four-week study period, participants who had listened to music each day experienced significant reductions in feelings of pain and depression. Such results suggest that music therapy could be an important tool in the treatment of chronic pain.

A 2015 review of research on the effects of music on pain management found that patients who listened to music before, during, or even after surgery experienced less pain and anxiety than those who did not listen to music.  

While listening to music at any point in time was effective, the researchers noted that listening to music pre-surgery resulted in better outcomes. The review looked at data from more than 7,000 patients and found that music listeners also required less medication to manage their pain.

There was also a slightly greater, though not statistically significant, improvement in pain management results when patients were allowed to select their own music.

Music May Help You Sleep Better

Insomnia is a serious problem that affects people of all age groups. While there are many approaches to treating this problem, research has demonstrated that listening to relaxing classical music can be a safe, effective, and affordable remedy.​

In a study looking at college students, participants listened to classical music, an audiobook, or nothing at all at bedtime for three weeks. Researchers assessed sleep quality both before and after the intervention.

The study found that participants who had listened to music had significantly better sleep quality than those who had listened to the audiobook or received no intervention.  

Music Can Improve Motivation

There is a good reason why you find it easier to exercise while you listen to music. Researchers have found that listening to fast-paced music motivates people to work out harder.

One experiment designed to investigate this effect tasked 12 healthy male students with cycling on a stationary bike at self-paced speeds. On three different trials, the participants biked for 25 minutes at a time while listening to a playlist of six different popular songs of various tempos.

Unknown to the listeners, the researchers made subtle differences to the music and then measured performance. The music was left at a normal speed, increased by 10%, or decreased by 10%.

Speeding up the tracks resulted in increased performance in terms of distance covered, the speed of pedaling, and power exerted. Conversely, slowing down the music's tempo led to decreases in all of these variables .

So if you are trying to stick to a workout routine, consider loading up a playlist filled with fast-paced tunes that will help boost your motivation and enjoyment of your exercise regimen.

Music Can Improve Mood

Another of the science-backed benefits of music is that it just might make you happier.

In one examination of the reasons why people listen to music, researchers discovered that music played an important role in relating arousal and mood. Participants rated music's ability to help them achieve a better mood and become more self-aware as two of the most important functions of music.

Another study found that intentionally trying to boost moods by listening to positive music could have an impact within two weeks. Participants were instructed to purposefully attempt to improve their mood by listening to positive music each day for two weeks.

Other participants listened to music but were not directed to become happier intentionally. When participants were later asked to describe their own levels of happiness, those who had intentionally tried to improve their moods reported feeling happier after just two weeks.

Music May Reduce Symptoms of Depression

Researchers have also found that music therapy can be a safe and effective treatment for a variety of disorders, including depression .

One study found that music therapy was a safe, low-risk way to reduce depression and anxiety in patients suffering from neurological conditions such as dementia, stroke, and Parkinson's disease.

While music can certainly have an impact on mood, the type of music is also important. Classical and meditation music offer the greatest mood-boosting benefits, while heavy metal and techno music are ineffective and even detrimental.

Music Can Improve Endurance and Performance

Another important psychological benefit of music lies in its ability to boost performance. While people have a preferred step frequency when walking and running, scientists have discovered that the addition of a strong, rhythmic beat, such as fast-paced musical track, could inspire people to pick up the pace.  

Runners are not only able to run faster while listening to music; they also feel more motivated to stick with it and display greater endurance. The ideal tempo for workout music is somewhere between 125 and 140 beats per minute.

While research has found that synchronizing body movements to music can lead to better performance and increased stamina, the effect tends to be the most pronounced in cases of low to moderate intensity exercise. In other words, the average person is more likely to reap the rewards of listening to music more than a professional athlete might.

So why does music boost workout performance? Listening to music while working out lowers a person's perception of exertion. You're working harder, but it doesn't seem like you're putting forth more effort.

Because your attention is diverted by the music, you are less likely to notice the obvious signs of exertion such as increased respiration, sweating, and muscle soreness.

A Word From Verywell

Music can inspire and entertain, but it also has powerful psychological effects that can improve your health and well-being.

Instead of thinking of music as pure entertainment, consider some of the major mental benefits of incorporating music into your everyday life. You might find that you feel more motivated , happy, and relaxed as a result.

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By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

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Jessica Grose

Screens are everywhere in schools. do they actually help kids learn.

By Jessica Grose

Opinion Writer

A few weeks ago, a parent who lives in Texas asked me how much my kids were using screens to do schoolwork in their classrooms. She wasn’t talking about personal devices. (Smartwatches and smartphones are banned in my children’s schools during the school day, which I’m very happy about; I find any argument for allowing these devices in the classroom to be risible.) No, this parent was talking about screens that are school sanctioned, like iPads and Chromebooks issued to children individually for educational activities.

I’m embarrassed to say that I couldn’t answer her question because I had never asked or even thought about asking. Partly because the Covid-19 era made screens imperative in an instant — as one ed-tech executive told my colleague Natasha Singer in 2021, the pandemic “sped the adoption of technology in education by easily five to 10 years.” In the early Covid years, when my older daughter started using a Chromebook to do assignments for second and third grade, I was mostly just relieved that she had great teachers and seemed to be learning what she needed to know. By the time she was in fifth grade and the world was mostly back to normal, I knew she took her laptop to school for in-class assignments, but I never asked for specifics about how devices were being used. I trusted her teachers and her school implicitly.

In New York State, ed tech is often discussed as an equity problem — with good reason: At home, less privileged children might not have access to personal devices and high-speed internet that would allow them to complete digital assignments. But in our learn-to-code society, in which computer skills are seen as a meal ticket and the humanities as a ticket to the unemployment line, there seems to be less chatter about whether there are too many screens in our kids’ day-to-day educational environment beyond the classes that are specifically tech focused. I rarely heard details about what these screens are adding to our children’s literacy, math, science or history skills.

And screens truly are everywhere. For example, according to 2022 data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, only about 8 percent of eighth graders in public schools said their math teachers “never or hardly ever” used computers or digital devices to teach math, 37 percent said their math teachers used this technology half or more than half the time, and 44 percent said their math teachers used this technology all or most of the time.

As is often the case with rapid change, “the speed at which new technologies and intervention models are reaching the market has far outpaced the ability of policy researchers to keep up with evaluating them,” according to a dazzlingly thorough review of the research on education technology by Maya Escueta, Andre Joshua Nickow, Philip Oreopoulos and Vincent Quan published in The Journal of Economic Literature in 2020.

Despite the relative paucity of research, particularly on in-class use of tech, Escueta and her co-authors put together “a comprehensive list of all publicly available studies on technology-based education interventions that report findings from studies following either of two research designs, randomized controlled trials or regression discontinuity designs.”

They found that increasing access to devices didn’t always lead to positive academic outcomes. In a couple of cases, it just increased the amount of time kids were spending on devices playing games. They wrote, “We found that simply providing students with access to technology yields largely mixed results. At the K-12 level, much of the experimental evidence suggests that giving a child a computer may have limited impacts on learning outcomes but generally improves computer proficiency and other cognitive outcomes.”

Some of the most promising research is around computer-assisted learning, which the researchers defined as “computer programs and other software applications designed to improve academic skills.” They cited a 2016 randomized study of 2,850 seventh-grade math students in Maine who used an online homework tool. The authors of that study “found that the program improved math scores for treatment students by 0.18 standard deviations. This impact is particularly noteworthy, given that treatment students used the program, on average, for less than 10 minutes per night, three to four nights per week,” according to Escueta and her co-authors.

They also explained that in the classroom, computer programs may help teachers meet the needs of students who are at different levels, since “when confronted with a wide range of student ability, teachers often end up teaching the core curriculum and tailoring instruction to the middle of the class.” A good program, they found, could help provide individual attention and skill building for kids at the bottom and the top, as well. There are computer programs for reading comprehension that have shown similar positive results in the research. Anecdotally: My older daughter practices her Spanish language skills using an app, and she hand-writes Spanish vocabulary words on index cards. The combination seems to be working well for her.

Though their review was published in 2020, before the data was out on our grand remote-learning experiment, Escueta and her co-authors found that fully online remote learning did not work as well as hybrid or in-person school. I called Thomas Dee, a professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education, who said that in light of earlier studies “and what we’re coming to understand about the long-lived effects of the pandemic on learning, it underscores for me that there’s a social dimension to learning that we ignore at our peril. And I think technology can often strip that away.”

Still, Dee summarized the entire topic of ed tech to me this way: “I don’t want to be black and white about this. I think there are really positive things coming from technology.” But he said that they are “meaningful supports on the margins, not fundamental changes in the modality of how people learn.”

I’d add that the implementation of any technology also matters a great deal; any educational tool can be great or awful, depending on how it’s used.

I’m neither a tech evangelist nor a Luddite. (Though I haven’t even touched on the potential implications of classroom teaching with artificial intelligence, a technology that, in other contexts, has so much destructive potential .) What I do want is the most effective educational experience for all kids.

Because there’s such a lag in the data and a lack of granularity to the information we do have, I want to hear from my readers: If you’re a teacher or a parent of a current K-12 student, I want to know how you and they are using technology — the good and the bad. Please complete the questionnaire below and let me know. I may reach out to you for further conversation.

Do your children or your students use technology in the classroom?

If you’re a parent, an educator or both, I want to hear from you.

Jessica Grose is an Opinion writer for The Times, covering family, religion, education, culture and the way we live now.