Effects of music on mood and cognitive performance

Has it happened to you that when you listen to a happy song you have a smile and you have felt euphoric? Or on the contrary, when listening to a melancholic song, has a sometimes inexplicable feeling of sadness seized you? Music and your brain have a very close relationship and the melodies you hear reach your brain, interfering with your emotions and with the abilities and capacities that it has to work.

Music accompanies us throughout our lives and we find it everywhere. It is a form of cultural expression that has enabled human beings to communicate by releasing and channeling different emotions, thoughts and ideas.. Whether dancing, singing or shouting, it is clear that music has a great impact on us and has therefore been the subject of study for a long time.

Specifically, how music affects our brain is a topic that has caused a lot of interest in different researchers within the area of ​​psychology. Therefore, in today's article, based on scientific evidence, we will focus specifically on how rhythms and melodies affect our mood and our cognitive performance.

• We recommend you read: "Music and personality: what relationship do they have?"

Effects of music on mood

As we mentioned at the beginning, music is more than capable of directing our state of mind. Such is its impact on us that it can even affect the way we perceive the world around us.. You may have felt that turning the music up loud and singing like no one is listening has therapeutic powers. But why does this happen? What changes does the brain undergo when listening to music?

When we listen to music that we like, our brain releases dopamine. This is a chemical substance that is associated with the feeling of pleasure and reward that makes us tend to repeat behaviors and consume again and again in search of that feeling. It could be a reason why we listen to our favorite song as if it were a broken record. In short, the dopamine that is released when listening to music makes us feel good and therefore improves our mood.

Speaking of favorite songs, researchers have also discovered what happens in our brain when we listen to that song we love so much. When listening to our favorite melody, the so-called default functional network (DNF) is activated in the brain.. This is the network responsible for much of the brain activity that occurs when the mind is at rest. In other words, our favorite song makes us wander and generates the feeling of being in Babia.

On the other hand, when we listen to sad or melancholic music, our brain releases a hormone called prolactin. It is a chemical that is associated with crying and sadness. Listening to a sad song activates this hormone and although it may seem contradictory, it has a positive effect. There is a very simple example to understand this. When we suffer a heartbreak, many of us like to put songs related to this topic to cry and sing them at the top of our lungs. With this action, we release prolactin, which in turn helps us process emotions and release accumulated emotional tension.

Leaving hormones aside, it is also interesting to emphasize the memories that music generates in us. Who does not listen to a song and it reminds them of a hot summer afternoon with their friends? Who doesn't have a song that reminds them of that special person as the years go by? It is as if music transports us to the past and makes us remember the moments and emotions we experienced when listening to that song. This is because music has been found to activate the hippocampus, the area of ​​the brain responsible for memory. In addition, it is important to highlight that those moments that have an important meaning for us are more accessible to our memory. That is, the brain associates music with memories when experiencing emotionally salient moments.

Effects of music on cognitive performance

Cognitive performance is a topic of great interest among researchers. Today, the great challenge is focused on describing specific markers of cognitive performance in order to to be able to establish which people are most likely to benefit from music as a therapeutic tool. Even if you are not a researcher, surely you have had a conversation about whether music worsens or improves cognitive performance.

Many times, the answers are varied, since there are people who have background music doing tasks helps them, and others who feel completely the opposite. The same is true of the studies carried out so far. The results are mixed and suggest that there are individual differences in the impact of music on cognitive function. and, therefore, the recommendations regarding their presence in the classroom, the study room or the work environment need to be personalized.

However, it can be said that those students with a great need for external stimulation should be careful when adding music, especially complex music that can capture your attention and consume critical cognitive resources that are necessary to successfully complete His homework. On the other hand, students with a low need for external stimulation can benefit significantly from the presence of music, especially when completing simple and common tasks.

The complexity of the task we are performing has a lot to do with the benefit of music. That is to say, the more complex a task is and therefore the more cognitive resources we need to complete it, the less beneficial music is. Definitely, when faced with a highly challenging cognitive task, even those with a low need for external stimulation may not show beneficial effects with music.

Finally, the type of music we listen to should also be taken into account to improve our cognitive performance. Music with lyrics worsens such performance due to its complexity. Therefore, it is recommended to listen to instrumental music in order to ensure the benefits in our cognition.

What is music therapy?

Music therapy is a therapy that makes clinical use of music in order to achieve specific therapeutic goals.. Its use has increased in recent years as it has been observed to generate sensory, motor, creative, emotional and cognitive benefits. More specifically and for the interest of this article, it has been discovered that at a cognitive level the ability to learning, improves orientation, increases attention span and concentration, and stimulates communication and language. In addition, at the socio-emotional level, it increases social interactions, improving social skills and self-esteem and thus preventing social isolation. In parallel, this therapy is also a very good ally against anxiety.

Music therapy is used throughout the evolutionary cycle. In the children's environment, it is used above all to help the little ones develop their communication skills. For this reason, this therapy is especially useful in children with ASD, ADHD, and other disorders related to communication and/or expression.

It is known that children with autism have repetitive behaviors and reject or ignore communication. Through music therapy we try to improve these behaviors and relax the child in different spaces. It should be noted that this group has a much more developed musical sensitivity than other children of their age and therefore, through the Music therapy tries to reach the world of this child through some musical element, in order to work therapeutic objectives specific.

Something similar occurs in children with ADHD. Music helps them channel all their energy, thus favoring their concentration and attention. In the emotional area, melodies are great allies to experience positive situations, in which you must learn to expect, in which he can express himself as he is, in which he concentrates and attends, and this can help his self-esteem.

The same goes for adults. Experts are harnessing the power of music to help seniors recover from diseases and brain injuries and alleviate the symptoms they cause. For example, after a stroke, in the vast majority of cases the ability to speak is lost. However, surprisingly they have the ability to sing and this is where music therapy can help. You try to achieve fluency in speech through singing and music. Along the same lines, people with Parkinson's are known to have great motor difficulties, and incredibly, dancing strengthens movement and improves their gait.

In the same way, with the elderly this technique is not far behind. Music is one of the few ways to enter the brain of people with Alzheimer's. Despite the profound memory loss caused by this disease, vivid memories can be recovered by listening to the same music they listened to when they were young. With this, they are able to remember episodes, moments, sensations and ideas and it is used as a technique for cognitive stimulation.