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A podcast by Dr. B and Linda Corley entitled "How Music Affects Your Moods"

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A podcast by Dr. B and Linda Corley entitled "How Music Affects Your Moods"

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How Music Affects Your Moods - When you're sad, play a happy song and watch the clouds lift. Need a good cry? Go to an opera and watch the tears flow. Why does music have such an effect on our emotions and behavior? Dr. B. breaks down the mechanics of music and explains how rhythms and melodies affect your mind and body.Infuse Fun into Your Relationship - Romance, communication, and respect are certainly essential to building a solid and loving relationship. But how do you keep the connection...

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‎The Breakdown with Dr. B: How Music Affects Your Moods on Apple Podcasts

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How Music Affects Your Moods - When you're sad, play a happy song and watch the clouds lift. Need a good cry? Go to an opera and watch the tears flow. Why does music have such an effect on our emotions and behavior? Dr. B.

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A TED talk by Natasha Perez entitled "Happiness Through Music"

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A TED talk by Natasha Perez entitled "Happiness Through Music"

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In her talk, Jenks High School student Natasha Perez explores the dichotomy between the types of music we listen to and the emotions we feel.

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A video from PBS NewsHour Student Reporting entitled "Why Does Music Affect our Moods so Much?

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A video from PBS NewsHour Student Reporting entitled "Why Does Music Affect our Moods so Much?

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Why does music affect our moods so much?

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An article from Pandora entitled "How Music Affects the Mood: The Science, Research, and Facts"

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An article from Pandora entitled "How Music Affects the Mood: The Science, Research, and Facts"

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How Music Affects the Mood: The Science, Research, and Facts | Insights

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Brain scans and psychological research are discovering the mechanisms that lead to mood changes or mood regulation that are associated with music.

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An article from Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare entitled "How Music Affects Your Mind, Mood and Body"

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An article from Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare entitled "How Music Affects Your Mind, Mood and Body"

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Do you find yourself tapping your foot while shopping? Or having all the feels while watching movies? No matter your race, ethnicity, age or gender, music is a common phenomenon that impacts everyone. Music can be a powerful tool with its ability to evoke strong emotional responses.

For example, music may lead to the release of dopamine, a feel-good neurotransmitter. Music is present in everyday life for most people. Here, we answer questions about how music can affect your brain and body.

Does Music Alter Moods and Relieve Stress?

The short answer is, yes! The Iso-principle is a tool that matches a music listening experience to a current mood or emotion and then gradually shifts to music that represents a desired mood or emotion. If you want to listen to a song that you pair with anger or sadness, go ahead, but don't let it repeat too many times. Move on to music of the mood you desire. A music playlist that gradually moves from uncomfortable emotions to comfortable ones can be a healthy coping strategy and facilitate a positive mood change.

What Emotions Can Music Make You Feel?

Music can validate your current emotional state and influence your emotional destination. Again, the Iso-principle can help us experience desired emotions. It works most effectively when we first find a song that matches our current feeling or mood. In music therapy, emotional regulation is frequently addressed. Music can elicit many, if not every, emotion. Knowing yourself and which music you pair with your emotions will improve self-regulation, or "feeling your feelings."

While culture, memories and associations influence music and emotions, Berkley found an overlap across cultures and compiled an interactive music map based on people's responses with 13 emotional dimensions that people in China and the United States self-reported. You can check Berkley's Interactive Music Map to find out what music makes you feel.

What Impact Does Music Have on Memory?

Music can help retain essential information despite memory loss. Music memory is stored in the hippocampus, centrally located in the brain. Therefore, music memories are less likely to be negatively impacted by age or disease.

A musical mnemonic device is a natural way to memorize and recall information. As children, we learn various academic and social concepts through songs. Similarly, these memory strategies are highly effective for adults. In fact, our brains automatically " fill in the gaps " when a song suddenly stops.

Music therapists often incorporate these techniques with individuals to improve memory retention or developmental learning goals. Music may activate memories and remind us of places, events or people. A familiar tune may elicit the emotions associated with those memories.

What Changes Does Music Have on Your Body?

Singing, playing instruments and even dancing can improve pain tolerance. Researchers found that the physical movement used to create music provides a synchronized activity that significantly heightens the pain threshold. Music therapists are specifically trained clinicians that use music to address goals such as pain reduction.

Because music is often an enjoyable activity, it can activate the release of endorphins, which creates a general feeling of well-being. Music therapy can successfully reduce post-operative pain, physical tension and influence heart and breathing rates. Fast music tends to increase pulse rate and blood pressure. Slow music tends to decrease pulse rate and blood pressure, as well as breathing rate.

How Does Music Affect Behavior?

Music can affect behavior by being a motivator, a timer for completing tasks or a mood enhancer. It may also impact our shopping habits.

Music is used in advertising to encourage brand recognition and create familiarity and positive association with various products.

Younger shoppers spend more time shopping when stores play instrumental music. Older shoppers spend more time shopping when there's music playing with lyrics. Baby boomers are likely to spend more money if classic rock is playing in a store. Generations older than baby boomers are less likely to spend money if any music is playing.

If you are buying wine for the holidays, be aware that classical music may make you feel comfortable spending a little more money than those top 40 hits.

Why Do We Enjoy Holiday Music?

Holiday music is a vehicle that communicates sacred and secular stories of the season. People may enjoy holiday music because pivotal cultural and traditional events are often intertwined. Music fosters community, remembrance and celebrations.

While many people have fond memories and traditions with holiday music, it is important to be mindful. Some people have equally painful memories associated with holiday music or songs.

Music Therapy

Music Therapists are trained clinical professionals that use music to accomplish physical, emotional, cognitive and social goals. There are music therapists at Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare in a variety of clinical settings and through classes. You can also search the Certification Board for Music Therapists' website to find a music therapist in your area.

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How Music Affects Your Mind, Mood and Body

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Do you find yourself tapping your foot while shopping? Or having all the feels while watching movies? No matter your race, ethnicity, age or gender, music is a common phenomenon that impacts everyone. Music can be a powerful tool with its ability to evoke strong emotional responses.

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A Psychology Today article entitled "How Listening to Music Affects Your Mood"

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A Psychology Today article entitled "How Listening to Music Affects Your Mood"

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Key points

Music is a tool that can ease negative emotions and enhance positive emotions.

Music can help people cope with stress or distract them from a bad mood.

Many people use music to trigger their memory and remind themselves of important past events.

Music makes life better. Music is used across cultures and ages as a powerful mood regulator. We regularly use music to soothe our souls and comfort our pain. The emotional power of music is one of the main motivations why people devote so much time, energy, and money to it. People use music to achieve various goals, such as feeling more energized, maintaining focus on tasks, and reducing boredom. For example, we rely on music to help us power through workouts and tackle tasks we'd rather ignore, and we manipulate our moods with melodies.

So, how does music produce such a powerful effect on the mind?

1. Coping with stress

Music offers a resource for emotion regulation. For instance, sad music enables the listener to disengage from the distressing situations (breakup, death, etc.), and focus instead on the beauty of the music. Further, lyrics that resonate with the listener's personal experience can give voice to feelings or experiences that one might not be able to express oneself. Listening to soft and slow music, such as classical music, is better for managing negative emotions compared to hard or heavy music. Listening to happy music can influence the way one perceives the world in a stressful situation. For example, upbeat tunes can give you an optimistic outlook and make you feel better.

2. Music and memory

Listening to a piece of music that was played a lot during a significant life event (e.g., a family celebration) many years ago can trigger a deeply nostalgic emotional experience. The feeling is not in the music, but in what it reminds us. Many listeners use music to remind themselves of valued past events, becoming nostalgic. For example, nostalgia is a powerful force around Christmas ('White Christmas'). Some people may have a fond memory associated with Elgar (Pomp and Circumstance) for graduation ceremonies, and Pachelbel's "Canon in D Major," (or Mendelssohn's "Wedding March" in C major) for weddings.

3. Pleasure in sad music

For some, sad music intensifies the feelings of sorrow and loss connected to personal events and memories. Listening to a sad song while in a sad mood is like someone (a friend) empathizing with your experience. The reward could be purely biochemical. We have all experienced the feeling of relief and serenity after a good cry. At the biological level, sad music is linked to the hormone prolactin (associated with crying), a chemical that helps to curb grief (Huron, 2011). Prolactin produces feelings of calmness to counteract mental pain.

4. The feeling of being moved

Music often makes us feel like crying because we experience a sense of awe and admiration. The feeling is a kind of wonder at realizing what other minds can create. In response to these emotions, we may experience goosebumps and motivation for the improvement of self and society. The experience is often intense and pleasurable.

5. Music and time perception

Music shows that time perception is essentially subjective - music can distort "clock time". Music is a powerful emotional stimulus that changes our relationship with time. Time does indeed seem to fly when listening to pleasant music. Hearing pleasant music seems to divert attention away from time processing. Moreover, this attention-related shortening effect appears to be greater in the case of low-arousing (calm) music with a slow tempo. For example, music is used in waiting rooms to reduce the subjective duration of time spent waiting or in supermarkets to encourage people to stay for longer and buy more. Consumers spend more time in the grocery store when the background music is slow. Music keeps workers happy when doing repetitive and otherwise boring work.

In sum, music can alter our moods, emotions, and motivation. We can use music to validate or challenge our moods. Music can also reflect the mood on a national level. For example, the protest song "Baraye," (the anthem of Iran's "Woman, Life, Liberty" protest movement) expresses Iranians' painful grievances.

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How Listening to Music Affects Your Mood

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Music can be seen as a coping resource that enhances internal abilities.

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An academic journal article from New School Psychology Bulletin entitled "Affective Responses to Music Without Recognition: Beyond the Cognitivist Hypothesis"

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An academic journal article from New School Psychology Bulletin entitled "Affective Responses to Music Without Recognition: Beyond the Cognitivist Hypothesis"

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An academic journal article from the International Journal of Psychology entitled "The Effect of Music-Induced Mood on Attentional Networks"

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An academic journal article from the International Journal of Psychology entitled "The Effect of Music-Induced Mood on Attentional Networks"

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An academic journal article from the Psi Chi Journal of Psychological Research entitled "The Impact of Music and Mood on Creative Thinking"

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An academic journal article from the Psi Chi Journal of Psychological Research entitled "The Impact of Music and Mood on Creative Thinking"