What efffect does music have on the brain?

[vantranist]

For SWIM a good sounding song the first time he hears it can provide a sense of euphoria greater than most drugs can provide him, what type of studies have been done on this?

theres no question that music can greatly change ur mood, i am sure we have all expeirenced this in our lives at some point and after expirmenting with many drugs SWIM can see music is very very similar to a drug.

any info or feedback on the subject would be great.

Reputation Comments on this post:

	Something overlooked by most, but VERY true.
	Excellent question.
	Very interesting thread

[psyche]

Obviously music can bring about strong feelings as drugs can. This is the first hit google gives you with words music and brains, it seems to be something like what you are looking for: http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/1...rBrainLis.html

Psychologically I think the euphoria from listening to (new) music is a result of a type of meditation. You attend your attention to music and start living in the flow. Then you forget about the past, maybe have a vague imagination of the possible future, but basically live only in the experience of the moment. I've found it to be soothing experience whether with the help of music or without.

As for songs getting better after several times of listening, it's the memories (of the feelings) of the past times you listened to it. Also for some it might make a difference that the tune becomes more familiar, so that you can recreate the song in your head just in the same time with or a little in advance of the real music. And that makes you feel like an artist actually playing the song, like he can hear the music he plays in his head, you feel like you can create the music. Or, better yet, that your mind and the music is all one.

[Broshious]

My question is what effect does the brain have on music? MDMA makes music sound great. Being depressed, for me, makes music sound terrible.

[fnord]

Music's interconnection with society can be seen throughout history. Every known culture on the earth has music. Music seems to be one of the basic actions of humans. However, early music was not handed down from generation to generation or recorded. Hence, there is no official record of "prehistoric" music. Even so, there is evidence of prehistoric music from the findings of flutes carved from bones.

The influence of music on society can be clearly seen from modern history. Music helped Thomas Jefferson write the Declaration of Independence. When he could not figure out the right wording for a certain part, he would play his violin to help him. The music helped him get the words from his brain onto the paper.

Albert Einstein is recognized as one of the smartest men who has ever lived. A little known fact about Einstein is that when he was young he did extremely poor in school. His grade school teachers told his parents to take him out of school because he was "too stupid to learn" and it would be a waste of resources for the school to invest time and energy in his education. The school suggested that his parents get Albert an easy, manual labor job as soon as they could. His mother did not think that Albert was "stupid". Instead of following the school's advice, Albert's parents bought him a violin. Albert became good at the violin. Music was the key that helped Albert Einstein become one of the smartest men who has ever lived. Einstein himself says that the reason he was so smart is because he played the violin. He loved the music of Mozart and Bach the most. A friend of Einstein, G.J. Withrow, said that the way Einstein figured out his problems and equations was by improvising on the violin.
Bodily Responses to Music
In general, responses to music are able to be observed. It has been proven that music influences humans both in good and bad ways. These effects are instant and long lasting. Music is thought to link all of the emotional, spiritual, and physical elements of the universe. Music can also be used to change a person's mood, and has been found to cause like physical responses in many people simultaneously. Music also has the ability to strengthen or weaken emotions from a particular event such as a funeral.

People perceive and respond to music in different ways. The level of musicianship of the performer and the listener as well as the manner in which a piece is performed affects the "experience" of music. An experienced and accomplished musician might hear and feel a piece of music in a totally different way than a non-musician or beginner. This is why two accounts of the same piece of music can contradict themselves.

Rhythm is also an important aspect of music to study when looking at responses to music. There are two responses to rhythm. These responses are hard to separate because they are related, and one of these responses cannot exist without the other. These responses are (1) the actual hearing of the rhythm and (2) the physical response to the rhythm. Rhythm organizes physical movements and is very much related to the human body. For example, the body contains rhythms in the heartbeat, while walking, during breathing, etc. Another example of how rhythm orders movement is an autistic boy who could not tie his shoes. He learned how on the second try when the task of tying his shoes was put to a song. The rhythm helped organize his physical movements in time.

It cannot be proven that two people can feel the exact same thing from hearing a piece of music. For example, early missionaries to Africa thought that the nationals had bad rhythm. The missionaries said that when the nationals played on their drums it sounded like they were not beating in time. However, it was later discovered that the nationals were beating out complex polyrhythmic beats such as 2 against 3, 3 against 4, and 2 against 3 and 5, etc. These beats were too advanced for the missionaries to follow.

Responses to music are easy to be detected in the human body. Classical music from the baroque period causes the heart beat and pulse rate to relax to the beat of the music. As the body becomes relaxed and alert, the mind is able to concentrate more easily. Furthermore, baroque music decreases blood pressure and enhances the ability to learn. Music affects the amplitude and frequency of brain waves, which can be measured by an electro-encephalogram. Music also affects breathing rate and electrical resistance of the skin. It has been observed to cause the pupils to dilate, increase blood pressure, and increase the heart rate.
The Power of Music on Memory and Learning
The power of music to affect memory is quite intriguing. Mozart's music and baroque music, with a 60 beats per minute beat pattern, activate the left and right brain. The simultaneous left and right brain action maximizes learning and retention of information. The information being studied activates the left brain while the music activates the right brain. Also, activities which engage both sides of the brain at the same time, such as playing an instrument or singing, causes the brain to be more capable of processing information.

According to The Center for New Discoveries in Learning, learning potential can be increased a minimum of five times by using this 60 beats per minute music. For example, the ancient Greeks sang their dramas because they understood how music could help them remember more easily ). A renowned Bulgarian psychologist, Dr. George Lozanov, designed a way to teach foreign languages in a fraction of the normal learning time. Using his system, students could learn up to one half of the vocabulary and phrases for the whole school term (which amounts to almost 1,000 words or phrases) in one day. Along with this, the average retention rate of his students was 92%. Dr. Lozanov's system involved using certain classical music pieces from the baroque period which have around a 60 beats per minute pattern. He has proven that foreign languages can be learned with 85-100% efficiency in only thirty days by using these baroque pieces. His students had a recall accuracy rate of almost 100% even after not reviewing the material for four years.



Johann Sebastian Bach
Georg Frederic Handel
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

In 1982, researchers from the University of North Texas performed a three-way test on postgraduate students to see if music could help in memorizing vocabulary words. The students were divided into three groups. Each group was given three tests - a pretest, a posttest, and a test a week after the first two tests. All of the tests were identical. Group 1 was read the words with Handel's Water Music in the background. They were also asked to imagine the words. Group 2 was read the same words also with Handel's Water Music in the background. Group 2 was not asked to imagine the words. Group 3 was only read the words, was not given any background music, and was also not asked to imagine the words. The results from the first two tests showed that groups 1 and 2 had much better scores than group 3. The results from the third test, a week later, showed that group 1 performed much better than groups 2 or 3. However, simply using music while learning does not absolutely guarantee recall but can possibly improve it. Background music in itself is not a part of the learning process, but it does enter into memory along with the information learned. Recall is better when the same music used for learning is used during recall. Also, tempo appears to be a key of music's effect on memory.

Play Handel's Water Music (Morning Has Broken)

One simple way students can improve test scores is by listening to certain types of music such as Mozart's Sonata for Two Piano's in D Major before taking a test. This type of music releases neurons in the brain which help the body to relax. The effectiveness of Mozart's sonatas can be seen by the results from an IQ test performed on three groups of college students. The first group listened to a Mozart sonata before taking the test. The second group listened to a relaxation tape before their test. The third group did not listen to anything before the test. The first group had the highest score with an average of 119. The second group ended up with an average of 111, and the third group had the lowest score with an average of 110.

William Balach, Kelly Bowman, and Lauri Mohler, all from Pennsylvania State University, studied the effects of music genre and tempo on memory retention. They had four groups learn vocabulary words using one of four instrumental pieces - slow classical, slow jazz, fast classical, and fast jazz. Each of the four groups was divided into smaller groups for the recall test. These sub groups used either the same (i.e. slow classical, slow classical) or different (i.e. slow jazz, fast classical) pieces when taking the recall test. The results did show a dependency on the music. Recall was better when the music was the same during learning and testing. These same researchers did another test which restricted the changes in the music to just tempo (i.e. slow to fast jazz) or just genre (i.e. slow jazz to slow classical). Surprisingly, the results showed that changing the genre had no effect on recall but changing the tempo decreased recall.
Healthy and Not So Healthy Effects
Many revealing scientific experiments, studies, and research projects have been performed to try and discover the extent of the power of music. Up until 1970, most of the research done on music had to do with studying the effects of the beat of the music. It was found that slow music could slow the heartbeat and the breathing rate as well as bring down blood pressure. Faster music was found to speed up these same body measurements.

The key component of music that makes it beneficial is order. The order of the music from the baroque and classical periods causes the brain to respond in special ways. This order includes repetition and changes, certain patterns of rhythm, and pitch and mood contrasts. One key ingredient to the order of music from the baroque and classical periods is math. This is realized by the body and the human mind performs better when listening to this ordered music.

One shining example of the power of order in music is King George I of England. King George had problems with memory loss and stress management. He read from the Bible the story of King Saul and recognized that Saul had experienced the same type of problems that he was experiencing. George recognized that Saul overcame his problems by using special music. With this story in mind King George asked George Frederick Handel to write some special music for him that would help him in the same way that music helped Saul. Handel wrote his Water Music for this purpose.

Another key to the order in music is the music being the same and different. The brain works by looking at different pieces of information and deciding if they are different or the same. This is done in music of the baroque and classical periods by playing a theme and then repeating or changing the theme. The repetition is only done once. More than one repetition causes the music to become displeasing, and also causes a person to either enter a state of sub-conscious thinking or a state of anger. Dr. Ballam goes on to say that, "The human mind shuts down after three or four repetitions of a rhythm, or a melody, or a harmonic progression." Furthermore, excessive repetition causes people to release control of their thoughts. Rhythmic repetition is used by people who are trying to push certain ethics in their music.

An Australian physician and psychiatrist, Dr. John Diamond, found a direct link between muscle strength/weakness and music. He discovered that all of the muscles in the entire body go weak when subjected to the "stopped anapestic beat" of music from hard rock musicians, including Led Zeppelin, Alice Cooper, Queen, The Doors, Janis Joplin, Bachman - Turner Overdrive, and The Band. Dr. Diamond found another effect of the anapestic beat. He called it a "switching" of the brain. Dr. Diamond said this switching occurs when the actual symmetry between both of the cerebral hemispheres is destroyed causing alarm in the body along with lessened work performance, learning and behavior problems in children, and a "general malaise in adults." In addition to harmful, irregular beats in rock music, shrill frequencies prove to also be harmful to the body. Bob Larson, a Christian minister and former rock musician, remembers that in the 70's teens would bring raw eggs to a rock concert and put them on the front of the stage. The eggs would be hard boiled by the music before the end of the concert and could be eaten. Dr. Earl W. Flosdorf and Dr. Leslie A. Chambers showed that proteins in a liquid medium were coagulated when subjected to piercing high-pitched sounds
On Animals and Plants, Too!
Tests on the effects of music on living organisms besides humans have shown that special pieces of music (including The Blue Danube) aid hens in laying more eggs. Music can also help cows to yield more milk. Researchers from Canada and the former Soviet Union found that wheat will grow faster when exposed to special ultrasonic and musical sounds. Rats were tested by psychologists to see how they would react to Bach's music and rock music. The rats were placed into two different boxes. Rock music was played in one of the boxes while Bach's music was played in the other box. The rats could choose to switch boxes through a tunnel that connected both boxes. Almost all of the rats chose to go into the box with the Bach music even after the type of music was switched from one box to the other.

Play Bach's Air on The G String
Play Strauss' The Blue Danube

Research took a new avenue when in 1968 a college student, Dorthy Retallack, started researching the effects of music on plants. She took her focus off of studying the beat and put in on studying the different sounds of music. Retallack tested the effects of music on plant growth by using music styles including classical, jazz, pop, rock, acid rock, East Indian, and country. She found that the plants grew well for almost every type of music except rock and acid rock. Jazz, classical, and Ravi Shankar turned out to be the most helpful to the plants. However, the plants tested with the rock music withered and died. The acid rock music also had negative effects on the plant growth.
Conclusions
One cannot deny the power of music. High school students who study music have higher grade point averages that those who don't. These students also develop faster physically. Student listening skills are also improved through music education. The top three schools in America all place a great emphasis on music and the arts. Hungary, Japan, and the Netherlands, the top three academic countries in the world, all place a great emphasis on music education and participation in music. The top engineers from Silicon Valley are all musicians. Napoleon understood the enormous power of music. He summed it up by saying, "Give me control over he who shapes the music of a nation, and I care not who makes the laws" .

To Know More

* Ballam, Michael. Music and the Mind (Documentation Related to Message). pp 1-8.
* Jourdain, Robert. Music, the Brain and Ecstasy. New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc.,1997.
* Lundin, Robert W. An Objective Psychology of Music. Malabar: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Company, 1985.
* Neverman. "The Affects of Music on the Mind." 3 pp. On-line. Internet. 20 December 1999. Available WWW: http://www.powell.k12.ky.us/pchs/ publications/Affects_of_Music.html.
* Scarantino, Barbara Anne. Music Power Creative Living Through the Joys of Music. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1987.
* Storr, Anthony. Music and the Mind. New York: The Free Press, 1992.
* Weinberger, N.M. "Threads of Music in the Tapestry of Memory." MuSICA Research Notes 4.1 (Spring 1997): 3pp. On-line. Internet. 13 November 1999. Available WWW: http://musica.ps.uci.edu/mrn/V4I1S97.html#threads.





http://www.cerebromente.org.br/n15/mente/musica.html

Reputation Comments on this post:

	good info, what a nice read
	great info
	Fantastic material

[beentheredonethatagain]

Fnord's post is very informative, I just wanted to add that certain notes have a resonating effect, they are felt within a persons body and connects with the brain, as a pleasure , or a sadness, and it can do both.

Music is a wonderful and mysterious thing, something hard to explain in words, best left to the ears, body and brain to explain.

[Lethargy]

My friend SWIM "blames" music for his drug use. He can go on amazing psychedelic journeys with highs, lows, euphoria and CEVs with music alone. The first time he used DXM he realized that drugs + music = !!!!!

Honestly I believe that we will never explain music with words, only with music, which leads into an infinite regress of explanation, getting fractally complex and beautiful...

[vantranist]

SWIM also noticed that when he is depressed (a comedown or natural) music is terrible, and when hes in a good mood usaully exitment music sounds amazing, music is also one of the things that made SWIM keep using drugs.

[jazzmetalguitar]

Music theory is essentially all about the relationship between humans and organized sounds. Every interval between notes can portray a feeling, every chord progression conveys a mood. It goes on and on. The music really has a soul of its own (not just an overly artsy claim). Certain chords like to resolve to other chords and certain cadences feel and sound complete. That said, it's not easy stuff to completely understand.

Check this video out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-fyWc6Mpd8

Schoenberg was a composer who decided to find a correct way to do everything completely musically incorrect. You will think it sounds odd, and yet it conveys a chaotic emotion. It works in the wrong way just as he aimed to do...music can get overly fascinating....don't dive in unless you are prepared haha.

Reputation Comments on this post:

you've done a great favor to me :) Schoenberg ROCKS

[staples]

This reminds me of a radiolab thing about music, so I added it to the audio archive under other audio. I forgot about radiolab, I'll add some more to the audio archive later because they're really interesting.

The audio entry just links to this mp3, to save you time.

[The_Unicorn_Masturbator]

I wonder what effect playing music has on the brain.

Reputation Comments on this post:

...

[beentheredonethatagain]

I know this for a fact jack. A jelous wife with a stratacaster guitar in a full wind up swing , has a kinda fucked up effect on the brain.

It has such effect that once is all you should ever need.

[Laudaphun]

Responses to music are easy to be detected in the human body. Classical music from the baroque period causes the heart beat and pulse rate to relax to the beat of the music. As the body becomes relaxed and alert, the mind is able to concentrate more easily. Furthermore, baroque music decreases blood pressure and enhances the ability to learn. Music affects the amplitude and frequency of brain waves, which can be measured by an electro-encephalogram. Music also affects breathing rate and electrical resistance of the skin. It has been observed to cause the pupils to dilate, increase blood pressure, and increase the heart rate.
The Power of Music on Memory and Learning
The power of music to affect memory is quite intriguing. Mozart's music and baroque music, with a 60 beats per minute beat pattern, activate the left and right brain. The simultaneous left and right brain action maximizes learning and retention of information. The information being studied activates the left brain while the music activates the right brain. Also, activities which engage both sides of the brain at the same time, such as playing an instrument or singing, causes the brain to be more capable of processing information.

According to The Center for New Discoveries in Learning, learning potential can be increased a minimum of five times by using this 60 beats per minute music. For example, the ancient Greeks sang their dramas because they understood how music could help them remember more easily ). A renowned Bulgarian psychologist, Dr. George Lozanov, designed a way to teach foreign languages in a fraction of the normal learning time. Using his system, students could learn up to one half of the vocabulary and phrases for the whole school term (which amounts to almost 1,000 words or phrases) in one day. Along with this, the average retention rate of his students was 92%. Dr. Lozanov's system involved using certain classical music pieces from the baroque period which have around a 60 beats per minute pattern. He has proven that foreign languages can be learned with 85-100% efficiency in only thirty days by using these baroque pieces. His students had a recall accuracy rate of almost 100% even after not reviewing the material for four years.

-fnord

This is fascinating! I just thought that it should be repeated as this is something that I think more people should be aware of. SWIM will verify that this is in fact true, as SWIM plays certain compilations of classical music when studying and finds it to be an excellent study aid. However, if SWIM plays any other kinds of music it is distracting. That's really interesting about the 60 beat per minute concept, unfortunately SWIM doesn't know much about music to determine which pieces are approximately 60 beats per minute. SWIM likes the Baby Genius Series... entitled Brain Power, IQ Builder, etc. Also, there is a series of compilations that all start with "The Most... .... in the Universe", some of which SWIM finds useful for studying. This music definitely DOES enhance and promote SWIM's learning when studying for university (I refrain from using the word "college" since it means different things in different countries.)

[Laudaphun]

Since last posting on this thread SWIM has learned that apparently, the effects of music on cognitive function are thought of highly enough by the world of academia that there are degrees offered in "Music Therapy". Not exactly sure where this is taught... SWIM had never really heard of it before and while it is not somethign SWIM would wish to pursue, SWIM was still pleased that it was available to others and others were pursuing it.

Something sort of ironic, but one of SWIM's bestfriends had been dating someone for the past few years... SWIM never thought to ask, but did so just the other day in regards to what her 4-year degree was in. "Music Therapy" was the reply, which sort of impressed SWIM that this was something that was more well known and widely recognized than she'd originally assumed.

...oppps, figured that the post would auto-merge with the last one.

[grandbaby]

There's a book out now called "This is Your Brain on Music" by Daniel J. Levitin, which explores the neurophysiology of our addiction to melody & rhythm.

[staples]

I can't believe I forgot to mention binaural beats here. The idea is that by using certain frequencies, different ones for each ear, the difference in these frequencies can superimpose brainwave patterns and thus allow one to easily achieve certain meditative states, or even states of focus. One of these frequencies doesn't even have to be in our audible range, and they are usually added under some soothing sounds, though I've heard of artists using it for certain music tracks.

Centerpointe is a big name in binaural beats, with their Holosync product. They used to provide a downloadable mp3 sample from their site but now it appears they want you to order a CD ("free", just give them your contact information...) to hear the sample. I believe I have their sample around here somewhere, I'll take a look for it tonight and upload it if I find it.

There are also programs to add binaural beats to your own music files, I think one is called I-Dropper or something, but it's not free. It uses (or did use?) an open source library, and think there's also an open source program that uses it... yeah gnaural

[Politicalchalk]

SWIM will post his experience. It was, to date, his most real experience of humanity. It was late night after the secret-tent show AFTER the main show (tonight: Victor Wooten!). SWIM met a beautiful girl who stayed in our camp, and thought the time we had a short, fond romance. It was a music festival in Chilicothe, IL. Anyways, it was day 2 after the show, everybody at the( show's attendee's identical twins) had been setting in, in it's varied forms, all night. SWIM wanders through the forest, hears a beat. Swim follows. Beat louder, getting brighter. And there it was...

The center had a huge bonfire. There were a dozen guitars, mandolins and banjos, steel drums and bongos, shaking and shouting and chanting, all in harmony, and through the music. And than the rain began. One would think this would drive people away, but not THESE people! They protected the fire and continued. I was welcome. I have never felt more welcome or accepted in my life. It is the basis of SWIM's morality and ontology.

After all, music IS the universal language...

NB: Staples, the concept of binaural beats sounds fascinating!! Can they be set up with simple amplifiers and a deck, or does one require a special device?

[Laudaphun]

I've found some specific compilations of classical music marketed as a learning aid. I have found that these really do aid while studying. For example, if I try to listen to some rock music, it helps for doing certain things, but really has a negative effect on SWIM's concentration while trying to read or study. SWIM doesn't understand much about how all this works, but SWIM has different types of music that seem to enhance certain activities... Such as to classical compilations for reading or studying, other types for different situations... when i'm getting ready to leave the house for the day, I'll switch to something with a much faster pace, more high-energy music for the last 15 minutes or so before walking out the door... sort of serves as a "cup of coffee" to get me going in the morning lol. I know it might sound odd, but that's just SWIM.

[dr_haldol]

From my own experience I know music can. When listening to music under certain conditions (not just for fun) it definitely is psychoactive.

Feelings seem to be pretty much the same compared to the things I've heard from persons talking about drug experiences.

[vantranist]

Thanks for the responses... however swim ment to ask about studies done more on the euphoria assoceated with music.

Are any nerotransmiters connected to pleasure altered when listening to music? why does music make people feel better?

[Politicalchalk]

Pleasures heard in Xanadu
Although the suspected damage in amusical individuals may be too fine to identify with current scientific imaging techniques, other imaging studies such as those conducted in Montreal have led to some spectacular discoveries about emotional responses to music.


One such study, performed by scientists at McGill University, showed for the first time that music activates the same reward or pleasure centres in the brain that respond to the pleasures associated with eating and sex.


The study is significant because it suggests music is as important to us as biologically relevant survival stimuli. "Although we can theoretically live and procreate without the ability to appreciate music, it seems important as far as our happiness and well-being is concerned," said Anne Blood, a co-author of the study, who is now at the Massachusetts General Hospital.


The study found that only music beautiful enough to consistently elicit the highly euphoric experience of chills or "shivers-down-the-spine" activated reward centres that are popularly recognized as pleasure centres of the brain.


These reward centres are part of a highly complex system that includes constellations of cells organized into functional precincts. The system is responsible for the natural pleasures associated with taste, sex, and warmth, for example. Such natural rewards lead to reinforcement or repetition of behaviour.


Although all pleasurable experiences seem to feed into a common reward system, the system has the power to discriminate and does not respond equally to all. The system may also be able to discriminate between different types of music, explaining why not all musical pleasures are equal, either intrapersonally or interpersonally.


Neurotransmitters deliver both the music and the high


Scientific studies have identified these pleasure centres by using psychically active chemicals and electrical stimulation. They have revealed that the nerve pathways require a neurotransmitter called dopamine. The action of this chemical seems critical in mediating responses that we perceive as rewarding, and it probably plays a key role in generating feelings of euphoria. Thus a blissful music experience quite likely has a chemical basis in the dopamine molecule.


The discrimination of musical sounds takes place in a recently evolved brain region called the auditory cortex, which is responsible for integrating and responding to a musical piece and deciding whether or not it is spiritually inspiring. However, musical information is processed in many other areas of the brain before it reaches the auditory cortex. Relatively primitive brain areas that regulate movement and memory may also contribute to our emotional response provoked by music. After various consultations, the brain makes a decision that leads us to dance, tap our fingers, grimace, or smile in appreciation. Interestingly, research shows that while we listen to music, motor areas of the brain also become active even if we don't initiate movement.


Singing as evolutionary anthem


Scientists are undecided on why such a refined system for music processing has evolved in humans or in other animals, for that matter. According to Blood, song may have evolved out of the language phenomenon called prosody, or the changing of tones in our speech when asking a question or making a statement. Other scientists, such as Dr. Sandra Trehub from University of Toronto, think it may have evolved out of attempts to soothe infants with non-verbal sounds.


Whatever the case, the discovery of Neanderthal flutes in Europe suggests that a "music instinct" has been developing within us for thousands of years. In the words of Ian Cross, a music psychologist at the University of Cambridge, "Without music, it could be that we would never have become human."
----------------------
Excerpt taken from: La Scena Musicale -- Vol. 8, No. 2
"How Biological is Music?" by Asha Jhamandas, Oct. 2, 2002

Reputation Comments on this post:

ty what i was looking for from the start

[kmanmind]

I've done a little reading on this, though it's always easy to blur the lines between neurology and psychiatry. The brain, or the auditory cortex more specifically, is what allows humans to "hear" music in the literal sense. If there is any damage to this part of the brain, one would find their perception of music HUGELY altered, perhaps in the form of simple pitch deafness, or more interestingly with compensatory visual hallucinations. The neurologist Oliver Sacks has written several books on the topic (btw he's one of the docs who first studied and hypothesized on L-dopa in treating Parkinson's and Tourettes). I know when I listen to tunes I can find myself lost almost autistically, completely unaware and indifferent to who or what is around me. And while it provides a calm for those of us who find it a luxury, there are clinical studies among Parkinsonians that using "rhythmical music," a classical march or something, can do a better job than L-dopa in treating chronic ticing and muscle rigidity, not only psychosematically, but pharmacologically. A very short term indication, I'm guessing, as the brain always seems to have a way of figuring itself out, many times for the worst.
I'm unclear as to the workings of L-dopa, but I'm pretty certain it's just a heavy dose a' Dopamine. It's seems to me that the brain may be incapable of objectifying music, if only because - every second you've lived and learned and listened and grown has all catalyzed into who are you are this instant, and music can't be seperated. It's a beautiful drug.

[vinylmesh]

Here's my theory.

1.The greatest effect of music is to do with the rythym. Humans have a sense of rythym so we can keep walking/running at an even pace.

Any beat slower than a slow-walk is considered too slow by most people and any beat faster than a sprint is too fast.

Anyway when you hear a good beat it tricks your brain into thinking you're moving.So it releases certain neurotrasmitters that naturally get released while you're running (dopamine, norepinephrine) (if it's a fast-ish beat). Anyway by tapping your foot you're furthering the illusion and even more gets released.If you actually dance/mosh/run/whatever then loads gets released giving you a high simmilar but better than running alone.

Conversely, slower beats lead to a decrease in these neurotransmitters, making you feel either relaxed or sad (depending on the type of music)

2.But there's more to music than just the beat.Certain note-intervals elicit specific emotional responses in humans which are most likely due to pre-language communication in our ancestors.

i.e different intervals meant fear/anger/joy ect.

We still probably use these in speech today.

These 2 factors interact to give us the mind-alteration that is music.

(blues= sad, blues played fast = rock'n'roll (not very sad)

there's other factors at play aswell but they're probably not as significant i.e. Instrument sound,pattern completion ect.


That's my theory...there's no actual proof for any of it but it makes sense!

[Mutil]

that Arnold Schoenberg stuff was pretty wacky...can only imagine how the brain's responding to that!

Swim likes intense music, and complicated/chaotic music. he almost liked the Schoenberg video! he thinks this carries over into his preference of drugs. he prefers a strong euphoria or jumbled senses over a vague good feeling.

Bach is better than Mozart, in my opinion.

By the way, has anyone else wondered what would happen if you went back in time, grabbed Mozart or some other great classical musician, took him back to the present, and handed him an electric guitar?

[Laudaphun]

Originally Posted by betsym

Music is swim's drug of choice! If she is depressed, listening to her favorite music will fix it within minutes. It most definitely must activate the brain's reward system, thereby affecting doapmine release, and the associated high, just like a drug that works the same way. BTW, the biggest release of dopamine in the brain is at the point of orgasm. In this way, Mother nature insures the continuation of the human race!Just like one gets pleasure from eating. Eating is also required for survival. Looks like Mother nature would have extended this pleasure to childbirth since the pain of THAT is almost enough to keep many women from ever having more than one child and sometimes none. But then the babies are so precious the pain is soon forgotten, along with being able to remember anything at all due to lack of sleep. Music is said to be the universal language of the soul. Swim "feels" music as well as hears it and couldn't imagine life without it. Anything that stimulates the brain's reward system is said to be addicting but that's not all bad. There could be biological reasons for that which serve a purpose.If people don't feel good, chances are sex will be the last thing on their mind. Instead of helping contiue the human race, they may wish to annihilate it instead, so the brain may very well be equipped to derive pleasure from things other than sex. Music fits in very nicely and puts swim in the mood. Swim also likes intense music like Mutil but also relaxing music.

SWIM will testify to the magical healing powers of music also. During some of SWIM's lowest points when it didn't seem like things could get any worse or SWIM could feel any less motivated to do anything other than lay around and have a big pity party for herself and the hole she had dug herself in. It was music that sparked something in her head that made something snap in her head and produced the motivation to get back up and dust herself off. SWIM remembers with great clarity these points in time and the feelings they evoked, the moments in time when she was witness to the cognitive effects music can have on the mood.

Reputation Comments on this post:

inspired me to revel in self-pity with music as a doorway out of there