Music

Music is a core human experience and generative processes reflect cognitive capabilities. Music is often functional because it is something that can promote human well-being by facilitating human contact, human meaning, and human imagination of possibilities, tying it to our social instincts. Cognitive systems also underlie musical performance and sensibilities. Music is one of those things that we do spontaneously, reflecting brain machinery linked to communicative functions, enlarged and diversified across a broad array of human activities. Music cuts across diverse cognitive capabilities and resources, including numeracy, language, and space perception. In the same way, music intersects with cultural boundaries, facilitating our “social self” by linking our shared experiences and intentions. This paper focuses on the intersection between the neuroscience of music, and human social functioning to illustrate the importance of music to human behaviors.

                                    Music is a fundamental part of our evolution; we probably sang before we spoke in syntactically guided sentences. Song is represented across animal worlds, birds and whales produce sounds, though not always melodic to our ears, but still rich in semantically communicative functions. Song is not surprisingly tied to a vast array of semiotics that pervade nature: calling attention to oneself, expanding oneself, selling oneself, deceiving others, reaching out to others and calling on others. The creative capability so inherent in music is a unique human trait.

The Benefits of Listening to Music

Researchers Trusted Source think one of the most important functions of music is to create a feeling of cohesion or social connectedness. Music remains a powerful way of uniting people like: national anthems connect crowds at sporting events, protest songs stir a sense of shared purpose during marches, hymns build group identity in houses of worship, love songs help prospective partners bond during courtship, lullabies enable parents and infants to develop secure attachments etc.

Music can improve memory

Music also has a positive effect on our ability to memorize. In one study, researchers gave people tasks that required them to read and then recall short lists of words. Those who were listening to classical music outperformed those who worked in silence or with white noise. The same study tracked how fast people could perform simple processing tasks — matching numbers to geometrical shapes — and a similar benefit showed up. Mozart helped people complete the task faster and more accurately. Music memory is one of the brain functions most resistant to dementia. That’s why some caregivers have had success using music to calm dementia patients and build trusting connections with them.

Music can help treat mental illness

Music literally changes the brain. Neurological researchers have found that listening to music triggers the release of several neurochemicals that play a role in brain function and mental health: dopamine, a chemical associated with pleasure and “reward” centers, stress hormones like cortisol, serotonin and other hormones related to immunity, oxytocin a chemical that fosters the ability to connect to others.

Music can help lower anxiety

There’s lots of evidence that listening to music can help calm you in situations where you might feel anxious. Source have shown that people in rehab after a stroke are more relaxed once they’ve listened to music for an hour. Similar Source indicate that music blended with nature sounds help people feel less anxious. Even people facing critical illness feel less anxiety after music therapy.

                              There’s conflicting evidence about whether listening to music has an effect on your body’s physiological stress response, however. One Source indicated that the body releases less cortisol, a stress hormone, when people listen to music. This same study referenced previous research stating that music had little measurable effect on cortisol levels. One recent Source that measured several indicators of stress (not just cortisol) concluded that while listening to music before a stressful event doesn’t reduce anxiety, listening to relaxing music after a stressful event can help your nervous system recover faster.

Music decreases fatigue

Anyone who has ever rolled down car windows and turned up the radio knows that music can be energizing. There’s solid science behind that lived experience. Music can make you want to move and the benefits of dancing are well documented. Scientists also know that listening to music can Source your breath rate, your heart rate, and your blood pressure, depending on the music’s intensity and fatigue.

In 2015, Source at Shanghai University found that relaxing music helped reduce fatigue and maintain muscle endurance when people were engaged in a repetitive task. Music therapy sessions also lessened fatigue in people receiving cancer treatments and raised the fatigue threshold for people engaged in demanding neuromuscular training, which leads us to the next big benefit.

Music boosts exercise performance

Exercise enthusiasts have long known that music enhances their physical performance. A 2020 research review confirms that working out with music improves your mood, helps your body exercise more efficiently, and cuts down on your awareness of exertion. Working out with music also leads to longer workout. In clinical settings, athletes who listened to high-intensity, fast music during warmups were motivated to perform better competitively. Research shows that syncing your workout to music can allow you to reach peak performance using less oxygen than if you did the same workout without the beat. Music acts as a metronome in your body, researchers said.