Psychology of Music

Music is a large part of many people's lives, especially to those that play musical instruments. Music can change people's mood at any time, whether they're working out, traveling, working, or just relaxing.

Like other expressive arts, music has the power to evoke feelings, whether they're feelings of happiness, sadness, tranquility, or nostalgia. Often times, people associate music with particular emotions and experiences.

In a study at Bristol University, Dr. Harry Whitsel and his peers found that simply playing 90-second snippets of carefully selected songs each evoked their own specific feelings or emotions, with a dramatic effect on the participants. For example, their heart rates appeared to slow down when they were listening to the music, perhaps due to concentration, and sped up rapidly when the music finished.

Although it is hard to find music that means the same thing to a lot of people, it is obvious that certain sounds, especially in movies, can add to the emotion that the creator intends for you to feel. With a lot of films, a strong score can actually make up for mediocre acting or dialogue.

Daniel Bloom's team from the University of California found results that suggest that filmmakers manipulate sounds to create nonlinear analogs in order to manipulate our emotional responses. After he and his peers analyzed a multitude of soundtracks from different genres, they discovered that horror films contained fewer abrupt frequency shifts and more noisy female screams to build tension.

A study conducted by Ron McCready found that classical music was able to reduce tension while grunge rock was found to increase hostility in listeners. However, that same study also provided other contradicting results, proving that music is dependent on both your individual tastes and what type of music you grew up with.

In conclusion, music's effect on your mood is instantaneous and impactful, but it's also dependent on your familiarity with what you're listening to, the setting you're in, the level of volume the music is played at (especially for songs where volume increases and decreases suddenly while it's playing), and the level of concentration you have while listening to it. The effect also depends on the genre and how it fits your mood, which is why certain songs can sound like heaven on a good day but get skipped on a bad day.

Now that you know how music can affect your mood, tell us what kind of music you like, why you think you like it, and how you think it affects your mood.