10 Proven Health Benefits Of Music Listening
Can you picture your life without music? Can you envision your existence without music? It would be similar to not being able to see in color. Everyone has a distinct favorite kind of music, but no matter what that style is, it will always make you feel good about yourself.
Have you ever wondered what some of the scientifically proven advantages of listening to music are? Here are a few examples. Consider the reasons why music makes you feel good in the first place.
Curiosity piqued my interest, so I performed some study into the benefits of music, the majority of which we are ignorant of, and how we might reap the benefits of this…
The Benefits of Listening to Music Have Been Proven
The following are some of the most significant advantages of listening to music. The advantages of which you are most likely now reaping the benefits without even recognizing it!
After reading this, consider how much your daily routine would be altered if you stopped listening to music everywhere you went.
1. It enhances your cognitive abilities.
When you are doing cognitive work while listening to music in the background, your performance will be enhanced. It has been shown that an individual’s emotional state has a direct impact on his or her capacity to increase cognitive function.
Because listening to your favorite music may help enhance your mood, it can also help you perform better at work, when studying, and in other situations as well.
2. It may help to improve your mood.
As previously said, listening to your favorite music may assist to improve your overall mood and well-being. This is something we all understand to be true. How often do you find yourself in a state of depression or rage, just to put on some music and find yourself completely transformed?
This link will take you to the study in which this advantage was shown.
3. It helps you lose weight.
The act of listening to music while eating has the potential to aid in weight reduction. According to the findings of the research, while participants were eating a meal while listening to music, the rate at which they ate the food slowed down.
As a result, they were full sooner than normal as a result of their stomach sending signals to their brain. Normally, you’d be eating at a quicker rate than these signals could be sent, leading you to feel full before your brain could properly recognize that you were.
As a result, eating less will assist you in losing weight.
4. It helps to alleviate depression.
These advantages are similar to a chain reaction!
The fact that music has the ability to improve your mood implies that it may also be used to treat depression in certain cases. There is, however, a catch. According to the findings of the research, only particular genres of music, such as classical music, can be used to alleviate sadness.
Techno and heavy metal music are categorically prohibited! Additionally, music might have the opposite effect, increasing depression.
5. It helps you to work out for longer periods of time.
It is possible to improve your exercise performance by using a playlist that is jam-packed with all of the finest workout music. This will allow you to go the additional mile that you would not have gone otherwise.
Our brain gets distracted by music, which allows us to be more present in our environment and to perform better in our workout routine, among other things. As a result of refocusing our attention on the music we like, we wind up accomplishing more work without even recognizing we are doing it.
6. Helps to expedite the recovery period after a workout.
Surprise, surprise! This one took me completely by surprise! According to the findings of the research, listening to music after a workout may assist in speeding up the recuperation period for your muscles.
Most of us will listen to music while exercising, but the idea of listening to music after exercising is novel to me. We get more relaxed as the result of listening to peaceful music, rather than strong or lively music, which is preferable.
7. It is effective in relieving pain.
It has been shown that music may lower the intensity with which we sense pain. In other words, it has the potential to minimize the amount of discomfort we experience.
Here is the study that was done in order to learn more about this.
In this article: How to Begin Getting Better Sleep and Adjust Your Sleep Patterns
8. It increases one’s desire to exercise.
Surely, we all noticed that this advantage was included on the list?
If you all go to the gym, go on runs, or ride your bikes, you all listen to music as you do so. There isn’t any doubt about that. You’d be insane if you didn’t!
Music has been found in studies to help individuals run faster and work harder in a variety of fitness situations. Take it into consideration the next time you go to the gym!
9. Improved Sleeping Conditions
I’m not sure whether this advantage extends to all types of music, but it certainly does with some of them.
However, according to the results of the research, people who frequently listen to classical music have a superior quality of sleep than those who do not. This research was carried out on college students who were suffering from insomnia.
Whatever the case, this might be a fantastic and natural technique to treat insomnia and enhance the overall quality of your sleep.
10. It has the ability to induce a meditative state.
Brainwave speed may be altered by listening to slow-tempo music, according to recent study findings. The impact produces brainwaves that are comparable to those that would be expected when in a state of meditation.
This has a therapeutic impact and may be used to treat behavioral disorders, migraines, and other associated concerns, among other things. It’s an excellent alternative to meditation, however you should absolutely consider including meditation into your daily practice because of the many advantages it provides.
11. It helps to reduce anxiety.
Another important advantage of listening to music is that it might help to reduce anxiety. According to some, the impact is similar to that of receiving a massage. As an alternative to going out and getting a massage, why not put on some soothing music and relax in your own home?
12. It helps patients relax before and after surgery.
It has been proved that listening to music may assist surgery patients relax before their procedures and lessen their stress levels once they have completed them.
This is a straightforward, yet very beneficial, benefit for the millions of individuals who have some type of surgery every year. This may be very beneficial if it were made more widely recognized and found its way into more operations throughout the globe.
Check out this article on how to travel like a boss without packing lightly.
13. It improves your mood when you’re driving.
How many of you sing along to the music that is playing in your vehicle on your way to and from work every single day?
Putting on some of your favorite music in the vehicle may do wonders for your overall disposition. For those who commute to work in the morning, this is very important to remember! Most likely, individuals who do this will be in a better mood for the rest of the day at the office.
Summary
Here are the 10 scientifically proved advantages of listening to music once more:
Improves your ability to think critically.
Helps to improve your mood and aids with weight loss
Depression is alleviated, and your exercise endurance is increased.
Increases the speed of post-workout recovery
Pain relief and increased drive to exercise are two benefits.
A higher level of sleep quality induces a contemplative state.
It has a calming effect.
Reduces anxiety in patients before and after surgery Improves your mood when driving Music has so many more advantages than we would expect to be associated with it. Because most of us already listen to music, the recommendation here is to either listen to it more or to make sure you keep listening!
Consider how many of these advantages we’ll lose on a regular basis if we quit listening to music in our everyday lives!
WHY LISTEN TO MUSIC
Make some music and you’ll be on your way to changing your mood in no time.
Music has been proved to improve mood and help people avoid depression in studies. It may also enhance blood flow in a manner similar to that of statins, reduce your levels of stress-related chemicals such as cortisol, and alleviate discomfort. Listening to music before a surgery may even help to enhance the result of the procedure after it has taken place.
Music has such a positive impact on people. Music, says Kim Innes, professor of epidemiology at West Virginia University’s School of Public Health, appears to be able to “selectively activate” neurochemical systems and brain structures associated with positive mood, emotion regulation, attention, and memory in ways that lead to beneficial changes.
For example, Innes was a coauthor of a 2016 research in which it was discovered that listening to music helped enhance mood and well-being in older persons suffering from cognitive decline as well as stress-related indicators. Her research compared the advantages of music to those of meditation, a discipline that has gained popularity in recent years due to its beneficial effects on mental health. Both behaviors, according to her research, were associated with considerable changes in mood and sleep quality. Meditation and music listening, adds Innes, “have the potential to be quite effective techniques for promoting general health and well-being.” Listening to music rather than meditating may seem like a much more feasible option for you, and these results are encouraging.
Nevertheless, scientists have discovered that music might be agitating and unsettled.
Dr. Joanne Loewy, an associate professor and director of the Louis Armstrong Center for Music & Medicine at Mount Sinai Beth Israel in New York, adds that silence may be more beneficial than random listening in certain situations. The researchers discovered that just playing any old music might really cause an anxious reaction in certain people. (If you need instances of how music can feed the fires of fear rather than squash them, just switch on the spooky soundtracks from films such as Halloween or The Shining.)
The improper music, according to Loewy, may also induce rumination and other negative mental states in addition to stress producing them. One 2015 research from Finland discovered that music may both enhance and prevent negative emotions such as wrath, aggressiveness, and melancholy, in the same way that it can contradict positive emotions such as happiness. Why? According to Daniel Levitin, a professor of psychology at McGill University in Canada who studies the cognitive neuroscience of music, the beat and other aspects of the songs we choose may regulate our heart rates and the activity of our brain’s neural networks.
According to Levitin, music with a leisurely pace, gradual chord progressions, and drawn-out notes has a relaxing impact, while chaotic and up-tempo music has the opposite effect. All of this, though, is subjective. According to Levitin, he has come across folks who claim that AC/DC is their favorite relaxing music. “These were folks who were used to listening to Swedish speed metal, so AC/DC was a welcome change for them,” he explains. It is impossible to find a single piece of music that will have the same effect on everyone.
He also claims that the brain does not include a single “music center.” “One thing that surprises people is that music stimulates practically every area of the brain that we’ve been able to map so far.” This alludes to the fact that music is global and has the ability to touch us.
As a result, Levitin believes you probably already have a collection of tunes that you can use to de-stress, pump yourself up, or otherwise modify your mental or emotional state. You only need to find them and put them in the right order. Take a deep breath and dive in. Just be sure you keep distractions to a minimum. “We delude ourselves into believing that we can perform two things at the same time,” he explains. While listening to motivational music might help you workout harder or for longer periods of time, soothing music will not help you relax if you’re listening to it while you’re scrolling through your news or social media feeds, according to him.
Consider the discipline of music therapy, which focuses on the use of music to enhance patient outcomes, if you want to develop an even deeper link between music and your health even further. According to Alan Turry, managing director of the Nordoff-Robbins Center for Music Therapy at New York University, “music therapy begins with the idea that, as therapists, we’re collaborating with a person who is looking to help themselves feel more complete or optimistic—or to discover parts of themselves they aren’t aware of—through the use of music.”
Music therapy may take on a variety of shapes and forms. “Guided imagery in music,” according to Turry, is a technique in which a skilled therapist helps a person explore her strengths and obstacles while listening to music that the patient selects. “Music has the ability to create a sense of [therapist-patient] attunement,” he explains. “Participating in music therapy makes the patient feel as if the therapist “truly understands me.”
Other types of music therapy may include singing or playing musical instruments, among other things. As he explains, “the way each of us creates music might disclose something about ourselves that can be used by a therapist,” he adds. When someone plays the drums in just one tempo or one dynamic, it may be a representation of their inability to be adaptable in other parts of their life.
According to Turry, “music is a method to bypass our reasoning side and come in touch with the emotional life that we frequently keep concealed from ourselves.” “If individuals are suffering difficulties, there is almost always a method that music may assist them.”
How Music Can Help You Feel Better
Music might be a fast way to improve your mood, but it’s becoming evident that there’s a lot more to the advantages of music than simply a short mood boost. Music has been demonstrated to have a dramatic influence on your body and mind in studies. 1 In truth, music therapy is a developing specialty of medicine that employs music to help people recover.
Music therapy practitioners are discovering that employing music to aid cancer patients may be beneficial.
Music and music therapy are being used by children with ADD and others, as well as hospitals, to aid with pain management, depression prevention, movement promotion, patient relaxation, muscular tension relief, and many other advantages that music and music therapy may provide. This is unsurprising, given music has a wide range of effects on the body and mind.
Music’s Healing Properties
Some of the impacts of music that assist to explain the success of music therapy are as follows:
Waves in the brain
Music with a strong rhythm has been proven to trigger brainwaves to resonate in time with the beat, with quicker beats fostering sharper attention and alert thinking and slower beats supporting a quiet, meditative state.
Furthermore, research has shown that the change in brainwave activity levels brought on by music might help the brain shift speeds more readily on its own as required, implying that music can have long-term effects on your mood, even after you’ve stopped listening.
Heart Rate and Breathing
Changes in brainwaves are accompanied by changes in other body activities. Changes in music may also affect those regulated by the autonomic nervous system, such as respiration and heart rate. 4 This may include, among other things, slower breathing, a slower heart rate, and the activation of the relaxation response.
Music and music therapy may assist to mitigate or avoid the negative consequences of chronic stress, encouraging not just relaxation but also good health.
State of Mind Music may also be utilized to promote a more optimistic mindset, which can aid in the prevention of depression and anxiety.
The positive or cathartic themes that may be expressed in the lyrics, as well as the uplifting sound of music, can all lead to a new mental state.
This may help prevent the stress reaction from wrecking havoc on the body, as well as maintaining creativity and optimism levels high, which can lead to a slew of additional advantages.
Other Advantages
Music has also been shown to have a variety of additional health advantages, including decreasing blood pressure (which may lessen the risk of stroke and other health issues over time), increasing immunity, reducing muscular stress, and more.
It’s no wonder that music is seen as a crucial tool to help the body keep (or become) healthy, given its numerous advantages and deep physical consequences.
Music Therapy is a kind of therapy that uses music
With all of these advantages, it’s no wonder that music therapy is becoming more popular. Many hospitals employ music therapists to help with pain management and other health-related issues. 8
Music therapists may also assist with a variety of other ailments, such as stress. Visit the American Music Therapy Association’s website for additional information about music therapy.
Using Music to Improve Your Health on Your Own
While music therapy is an essential discipline, you may benefit from music on your own as well. (You may have been doing this since you were a teenager, but as we now know, it’s a good idea to maintain integrating music into your everyday life as you get older.)
Music may be utilized for relaxation, gaining energy when you’re tired, catharsis when you’re coping with emotional stress, and many other things.
Music may help us forget about the tension of a long journey, keep us motivated to exercise, and transport us to happy memories from our past, which can be both a happiness booster and a stress relief.
