Tag Archives: music

Can music heal pain?

22 Monday Nov 2021

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Are you in pain? Listening to music can help! A study at the University of Utah Pain Research Center measured the effect of music on the perception of pain – while people were having their fingertips jolted by electricity. The surprising result: The more the participants became absorbed in the music, the less painful the electrical jolts felt – even though the intensity of the shocks stayed the same.

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How about a happy mood boost?

08 Monday Feb 2021

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Need a boost of happiness? Listen to music you love but haven’t heard in forever. According to the journal Science, forgotten musical favorites provide the biggest mood boost. That’s because they combine nostalgia AND novelty, which activates the brain’s reward centers better than either one alone. 

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Want to boost your heart health?

16 Tuesday Jun 2020

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Avoid listening to music you don’t like! Researchers from the University of Maryland found people forced to listen to songs they disliked saw their blood vessels constrict about 6% within 30 minutes, which reduced blood flow, strained their heart, and raised the risk for clogged arteries. While people listening to their favorite songs saw their blood vessels expand by 26%, making them wider and more relaxed. And their bodies were pumping out nitric oxide, a compound that helps prevent the clots that can trigger a heart attack.

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Want to reduce physical pain?

28 Thursday May 2020

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Listen to music! Researchers at the University of Utah Pain Research Center measured the effect of music on people who received painful – yet harmless – electrical shocks to their fingertips. The result: Those who focused on the music, and followed the melodies, or concentrated on the lyrics felt less pain than those who weren’t hearing music. The reason? Because music triggers emotional responses and captures people’s attention, which is a distraction. Music also activates sensory pathways to the brain that compete with pain pathways. So fewer pain signals actually get through.

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Make the best of being stuck in the house…

02 Thursday Apr 2020

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…dance away – even if you have two left feet! It’ll help you bond with others and reduce feelings of pain. That’s according to a study in the journal Biology Letters. Because when we move in sync with others, everyone’s mirror neurons light up, which facilitates bonding. And the physical activity and music encourages the brain to release feel-good chemicals that blunt pain. Two solid reasons to get your groove on!

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Want to feel happier and be more productive?

27 Thursday Feb 2020

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Play some tunes, but put your playlist on shuffle!

Research shows that when we don’t know what song is coming next, the pleasure centers of our brain light up. And every time there’s a musical surprise – which happens every 3 or 4 minutes – we get a flood of feel-good brain chemicals. They not only perk up our mood, they improve our memory and help us solve complex problems.

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To reduce stress – listen to music!

17 Monday Feb 2020

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While classical music has a particularly soothing effect – it slows heart rate, lowers blood pressure and even decreases levels of stress hormones – ANY music that you love will flood your brain with feel-good neurochemicals like dopamine.

And music is particularly beneficial if you’re in the middle of a stressful event. If you don’t have access to music, make your own. A study on stressed-out nursing students found that singing relieved their stress and prevented burnout.

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Reduce stress by listening to this music – LIVE!

16 Friday Aug 2019

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What can reduce stress in everybody – young, old, men, and women? Hearing classical music played LIVE! A study in the journal Public Health found people who attended a concert had significantly lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol. And that was even true for people who didn’t usually go to concerts or weren’t familiar with the music being played. It’s partly because classical music has been shown to lower heart and breathing rates… and partly because experiencing the same thing with others makes us feel part of a community – and that social support reduces stress.

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Music soothes the savage beast.

02 Tuesday Jul 2019

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You’ve heard the saying, “music soothes the savage beast.” Well, new research shows that classical music can soothe your cat! According to the Journal of Feline Medicine, classical music has the most calming effect on cats by far – while pop music came in second.

And classical is especially effective because it tends to contain tempos and frequencies that match a cat’s purring.

So try playing classical music in the car the next time you have to take your cat to the vet!

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Concerts and earplugs

25 Friday May 2018

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Next time you attend a concert or music festival, bring earplugs. According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, it could save your hearing!
For the study, researchers measured the hearing of volunteers before and after a music festival where the sound was roughly 100 decibels – which can cause permanent hearing damage within 5 minutes. Among people who wore earplugs, only 8% experienced hearing damage. But 42% of those who didn’t wear earplugs showed measurable damage.

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