Music Brain and Life Merve Gozutok

MUSIC, BRAIN AND LIFE There are a lot of environmental factors which shapes human’s life. People are under the influence of his environment from born to death. To illustrate, babies do what they see, repeat what they hear such a copy-paste method. Their toys, clothes, colours surrounding, lullabies sung to them all give direction their personality step by step. Similarly, about teenagers ,they are affected by their environment along their whole development process. For example, their friends, teachers, who build their perspectives on what a juvenile got from his family, films and of course music have a great impact on youth for choosing an ideal life style. Music gives a meaning to films which they watch, supports the emotions which they feel at that moment like love, hate, happiness and sadness. In accordance with all of these, people form their life styles by their music choice, follow a trend and thus set their relationships, their circle of friends. To generalize, starting with lullabies, anthems ,cheers for matches, weddings and even funerals gain a meaning in company with music. Music can manage all the things only with the perfect collaboration with human brain. A neuroscientist Wilkins(2011) states that brain includes many parts responding to music, due to the fact that the groups of different neurological processes are got together by listening music. He also says that on the contrary as known, listening music is not just a right-brained activity, it follows a complex path, and explains the mechanics of music by saying that temporal lobe gets data from ear and determines the pitch and volume of sound. And rhythm brings in the left frontal cortex, and chases the ways of left parietal cortex, and right cerebellum. He adds last stage that “the prefrontal cortex, cerebellum, and many parts of the temporal lobe all go into our ability to recognize the tone of a given piece of music”. According to Bodeeb(2011),researches via MRI(magnetic resonance imaging) show that when listening music, brain’s different parts are activated. For example, while forebrain tries to decode the structure and meaning of music, cerebellum responds to music emotionally. In addition to ,music provide nucleus accumbus and ventral tegmental parts of the brain with releasing dopamine which is a chemical making people feel happy. And lastly, medial prefrontal cortex reacts to memories recalled from past. As can be seen, music has great impact on human brain. The purpose under doing this study is to find the answer of the question:”How does the relationship between music and human brain affect human’s life?” A variety of studies, experiments and observations support the idea of the fact that music has enormous effect on human’s life. As mentioned, while listening to music, some information go through to the related parts of the brain, spread out in there and after decoded, become classified and gain an identity. Because of these related parts correspond to wide area; there is a remarkable feedback which affects humans in many ways.(Wilkins,2011). As reported by O’Callaghan(2013),music training can cause changes in the brain’s structure.To illustrate,if a child starts musical training until becoming 7 years old,his corpus callorum (a part of the brain) will be larger comparing with the others’. It can be said that the most commonly suggested ways which humans are influenced by the music are contribution to intelligence, application for treatments of some certain disorders and controlling the emotions. Music as an Intelligence Promoter Most scientists claim listening to music promotes intelligence. In this context, the most significant thing to explain is “The Mozart Effect”. The Mozart Effect is associated with the fact that listening to Mozart’s music leads to development on the mental tasks known as “spatial-temporal reasoning” which can be described as being able to set up relationships between subjects (Bilhartz,1999). To examine the Mozart Effect, plenty of satisfactory studies were conducted. To illustrate, Steven(2000) states that, there was a study in 1995 to observe the Mozart Effect with the participation of seventy-nine college students who are taken a single spatial cogitation test from the Standford Binet Intelligence scale. While twenty-six students listened to silence for ten minutes, twenty-seven students listened to Mozart during the same time. Second group progresses day by day, while the first group’s improvement occurs only one day. Even if the result doesn’t seem so significant, by doing tests in succession, it was seen that general intelligence increases. In addition to Mozart Effect, he also suggested that listening to music helps students to reach the academic success. Schmidt (as cited in Steven), a member of the National School Boards Association, claims ”students who participate in music earn higher grades and score better on standardized tests”. In an experiment, a group of pre-school children were given musical training for six months, whereas some of the children were just given computer lessons or no certain education. At the end of six months, when they were applied spatial-temporal reasoning test, it was observed that ones who got musical training were %30 more successful than the others(Jenkins,2001). Similarly, Bilhartz claims in another experiment, which is carried out by Gromko and Poorman in 1998, one group of preschool children were given a training which includes singing and playing songs, and the other group didn’t take anything related to music. After 7 months ,it was seen that the experimental group was more successful than the other in a Wechsler Performance IQ test. As can be seen in these studies and ideas, listening to music or musical training is an intelligence promoter for humans. A Therapeutic Tool Music Music is successfully used to treat various kinds of ailments in accordance with medical treatments. Karas( 2007) states that music therapy can be classified in four groups: Singing,rhythm and rhythmic movement,playing an instrument, and lastly listening to music.And she explains all of them. Singing is helpful for Alzheimer patients to regain their memories from past and to express how they feel ,because they aren’t able to do this any other way.Furthermore, Melodic Intonation Therapy ,a kind of a music therapy, is used for ones suffering from aphasia( a language disorder) to refine their speaking skills.Secondly rhythm and rhythmic movement used for Parkinson’s patients’ treatment to enhance their motion areas,joint mobility,agility,strength,balance,coordination and muscular relaxation.Next, learning an instrument is beneficial for patients with traumatic brain injury to development of motor coordination because group works help them to take control of distracting impulses.Lastly, listening to music gives relaxation and helps to ease the pain.For example, according to Vouhe (2011), music can be used in surgeries thanks to its leading factors such as easing pain, stress and anxiety, and decreasing the requirement of morphine.Today, a lot of surgical center prefer to use music in their operating rooms . Besides, like being helpful for patients, music has an positive effect on operating room staff such as doctors, nurses etc. It can be said that music affects communication between colleagues positively, and music gives people calmness.Similar to Vohue, Macdonald(2012) states that music is a soothing tool before,during and after the surgery.He also says that according to study conducting on children while blood sampling, some of children were exposured to Indian classical music,some of them were given placebo, and the others were taken a local anaesthetic cream. The conclusion shows that children who were exposured music and ones taken local anaesthetic cream felt pain dramatically decreased during the venipuncture.Thus, music can be used besides to the medical methods to cure various kinds of disorders. Music: Endless Source of Emotions That music is the endless source of emotions is an commonly agreed issue by many scientist. Vaidya(2004) and Juslin (2008) states that although emotions evoked by music may change person to person according to taking place, culture and spontaneous psychology, it is agreed that music brings common emotions like happiness,sadness and anger.In addition to this, Vaidya(2004) claims that happiness can be arisen by major keys and rapid tempos,while minor keys and slow tempos leads to sadness.And if rapid tempos are gathered with dissonance,this composition causes feeling of fear. For example, as found in a study, paralimbic regions of the brain which are related to emotional evolution are observed that their activity increases by the changing degrees of dissonance. He also adds that hormone levels on the body are influenced by music as decreasing the level of cortisol( arousal and stress maker) and increasing the level of melatonin( leads to sleep).This factor of music make listeners relax,calm and make them feel in peace.However,like the others Sloboda (1999) ( as cited in Davidson,2011) also agrees the idea of music’s emotional effects with regard to his study,which conducted with 76 participants, and he got various respondents such as exciting,motivating,calming,moving to tears,shivering ,putting in a good mood etc. Besides, according to North et al. (2000) (as cited in Davidson,2011) when teenagers listen to pop and kinds of dance music, they feel less lonely, more enjoyment,and they can get over the difficult times more easily. And he continuos with saying “ the different strategies used for emotion regulation were found to be ‘revival’(feelings of reviving,relaxing,getting energy), ‘diversion’ (forgetting about current negative mood), ‘discharge’ (music gives from to the expression of current negative mood),’solace’ (feeling understood and comforted), ‘entertainment’ ( lifting up spirits,maintaining positive mood) and ‘mental work’(music promotes imagery,insights,clarification,and reappraisal of experiences). In the light of mentioned studies above, without any hesitation, scientists have already found some strong links between music and human brain. It can be said that music is in interaction with human brain, reaching different parts of it. Therefore, people are under the control of music unconsciously and of course in positive way. Listening to music, can be cooperative factor in medicine to heal some kinds of treatments both psychological and physiological. Additionally, music can regulate moods by its soothing characteristic. Besides its healing and relaxing functions, listening to music can also has a role in intelligence development process. Therefore, it can be said that when one listens to music, s/he may be affected in many ways. Although there are some ideas that claim music has negative, or not at all, effect on people, music has an enormous role in people’s lives for every life span. Thus, people should listen to music every possible moment in their lives. Music and brain relationship is quite indisputable issue, nevertheless, there are some counter arguments, which oppose the idea that music affects people positevely. One of them is related to intelligence improving factor of music. Those who support music has negative effect on people say that when studying, listening to music may slow down the learning process. A result of studies conducted by Tucker and Bushman (1991) shows that students who study in silence, in other word without any music, are more successful in mathematical and verbal comprehension tests. However, music supports the brain while studying. Recent studies show that mathematical skills increase during years with the engagement of music. It is most likely that the students who take part in musical training can get more grade in language arts and math tests than ones who do tests in non-musical environment. It was researched that if children gets musical training, their verbal memory will be improved more than the others.I believe that while listening to music, while trying to memorize the lyrics, the verbol memory is unwillingly improved. On the other hand, those who against the idea of music’s affirmative effects on people claim that music affects behaviours in such a bad way. Weight (2011) states that some kinds of music with lyrics including violence lead youth to have violent behaviours and leads them to be anti-social. Although listening to regulate moods and emotions, music never leads to violence, on the contrary, it gives relaxation and feelings like happiness. According to Vaidya (2004), music has an influence on hormone levels in body, that is to decrease the release of cortisol which is linked with stress. Music can give sadness as well as happiness but it doesn’t lead people to behave harshly. Reiss (2013) says “ Music is a good outlet for feelings. When you’re depressed, you listen to sad songs; when you’re angry, you listen to violent songs. The violence is already there; the music isn’t causing it.” It can’t be ignored that listening to music is promoter for intelligence and emotions. To illustrate, in my opinion, studying is boring and by listening to music you can make it more enjoyable or endurable. Once a person listens a song or hears a music, s/he feels a movement inside. The same movement occurs in the brain also, and this leads a person to think extensively, to solve problems more easily and to comprehend the topics more quickly. Music feeds the brain and makes people more successful in their academic lives. On the other hand, think about emotions, it is obvious that why people listen music is to support their instant mood. When they are sad, they listen slow music to forget their heartbreaks and maybe let their teardrops drain away, or when being happy, they listen upbeat music to dance; or else while being angry, usually rock music is listened with high volume to suppress the stress, but not to behave violent. Feelings aren’t emerged by music; they can only be the choices of what kind of music being listened at that time. Those who support music has no effect on people’s lives claim that treatment with music is impossible. Dökmen (2011) claims that there is no such a thing that music treats disorders saying that psychological symptoms, brain damage, liver inflammation or meningitis can’t be destroyed by listening to music. However, despite the fact that it can’t heal every illness by its own; it is conducive factor besides medical methods. Music gives relaxation, eases the pain and anxiety so, it is used as soothing tool both before and during a operation. In addition, Dr. Oliver Sacks says that music therapy can be used to treat Alzheimer’s and Parkinsonian patients. One of his Alzheimer’s patients was able to remind memories from past after the music therapy. The other patient who faced with Parkinsonian disorder( disable to talk and walk straight) could sing and dance perfectly after the musical treatment (as cited in Karas,2007). Although music cannot heal every disorder, its contribution to medical methods can’t be denied. Another aspect argued by my opponents is that there is nothing as The Mozart Effect. According to a professor of University of Vienna, there is no spatial ability to get from listening Mozart’s music. Pietschnig ( 1993) says that "I recommend listening to Mozart to everyone, but it will not meet expectations of boosting cognitive abilities.” However, listening to Mozart’s music affects people widely. According to my researches on listening to music, it helps students to get higher marks on cognitive texts and to score really higher grades on IQ test conducted in some universities. For example, Thompson (2001) suggests that according to a study ones who listened Mozart music reached more positive mood than ones who listened Albinoni’s music. I agree with that idea Mozart’s music leads people to think more optimistic and makes feel them more satisfied. We can see that not only success but also emotions are influenced by the Mozart’s music in a positive way. Therefore, it can’t be said that there is no effect on people by listening to music. And it can’t be ignored that the Mozart Effect and the fact that music has great role in medical treatments. Music gives relaxation to body and brain, and consequently via listening to music in operations and treatments, feeling of the pain can be reduced. This is beneficial to both patients and operation stuff of course. Without any hesitation, i can say that listening to music is the secret of maintain the wellbeing. In conclusion, even if there are some opposite ideas, listening to music has an significant role in peoples’ lives, because it is in interaction with our brain which leads us how to live. Therefore, it heals, supports the feelings, and contributes our success in life. Everywhere we go, everything we do includes music from born to dead. This could have a meaning. One can do better his/her life by assigning the music his/her best friend. Considering all of these it can be said that there is no doubt that listening to music affect human with many aspects and in positive way. References: Bilhartz, Terry D., Bruhn, Rick A., Olson, Judith E., (1999) The effect of early music training on child cognitive development [Abstract]. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology,20, 616-617. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0193397399000337 Deliege, I., Davidson, Jane W. (2011). Music and the mind: Essays in honour of Jhon Sloboda. United States, NY: Oxford University Press Inc. Demorest, Steven M., Morrison, Steven J. (2000,September). Does music make you smarter?: This discussion explores some of the research studies that have proposed connections between musical involvement and general intelligence . Music Educators Journal, 87, 34-37. http://mej.sagepub.com/content/87/2/33.full.pdf+html Dökmen, Ü. (2011). Müzikle ve burçla tedavi olmaz. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100510075415.htm Hjortsberg, Robert W. (2009). The effects of different types of music on cognitive processes. Retrieved from http://clearinghouse.missouriwestern.edu/manuscripts/303.php Jenkins, J.S. (2001,April). The Mozart effect. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 94, 170-171. http://jrs.sagepub.com/content/94/4/170.full Juslin, Patrik N. (2008). Emotional responses to music: The need to consider underlying mechanisms. Journal of Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 31, 559-560. http://www.brams.umontreal.ca/plab/downloads/Peretz2008BBS.pdf Karas, S. (2007). Music as a therapeutic tool. In The Spiritual Journey of Family Caregiving. Retrieved from http://www.healingcommunication.com/Music_as_a_Therapeutic_Tool.html Macdonald, R., Kreutz G., Mitchell L. (2012).Music, health & wellbeing. United States, NY: Oxford University Press Inc. O’Callaghan, C., Hiscock N., Goodwin M. (2013). Music, intelligence, and the neurocognitive effects of childhood cancer treatment [Abstract]. Music and Medicine ,5, 93-98. http://mmd.sagepub.com/content/5/2/93.short Reiss, C. (2013). Stop blaming music for violence. Retrieved from http://www.kaneland.org/krier/2012/02/23/society-needs-to-stop-blaming-music-for-violence/ Thompson, William F., Schellenberg, Glenn E., Husain , G.(2001,May). Arousal, mood and the Mozart effect. Psychological Science,12,248-249. http://www.erin.utoronto.ca/~w3psygs/Thompson2001.pdf University of Vienna (2010, May 10). Mozart's music does not make you smarter, study finds. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100510075415.htm Vaidya, G. (2007). Music,emotion and the brain. Retrieved from http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro04/web2/gvaidya.html2 Vouhe, Pascal R. (2011). The surgeon and the musician. European Journal of Cardio-thoracic Surgery,39, 1-2 . http://ejcts.oxfordjournals.org/content/39/1/1.full Wilkins, A. (2011). What happens to your brain under the influence of music? . Retrieved from http://io9.com/5837976/what-happens-to-your-brain-under-the-influence-of-music Positive & negative effects of music. Retrieved from http://www.ehow.com/about_5316884_positive-negative-effects- music.html#ixzz2SjiWwgSAMusicophilia; Oliver Sacks, PhD; 2007 Merve Gözütok Section 4 1863596 8