PSYCHOLOGY BEHIND MUSIC
We have all come across memes and statements that float around the internet that talk about how one’s taste in music draws an entire personality sketch of the individual at hand, how different persona types relate to different genres of music, music and its correlation to social behaviour so and and so forth. We know how music has become an integral part of our lives and the universal truth of how music helps individuals in different phases of life, partnering up for the ups & downs and is a form of expressing emotions.
Once the music is switched on, one gets switched off from the surrounding environment. Why does that happen? There must have been instances where you are listening to music and forget your external settings, times where music has helped you decipher your own emotions, moments where you resort to music over conversations and the list goes on. What is the relevance of music when it comes to emoting? Is there a connection between music and human emotional behaviour? What does music have to do with your mood? Is music a form of emotional communication?
The psychology of music stems from the branch belonging to both; psychology & musicology. Psychology behind music helps one understand the multiple facets of human behaviour varying from attitude, creativity, skill, intelligence, performance & social behaviour. Music stimulates one’s neural structure. The sensory message prompted by music correlates to one’s past experiences and the emotions triggered by it, thus guiding the individual’s behaviour in relation to music.
The psychology of music has risen above the many building bricks that are the historical schools of thought. With regard to research done in the past by Wilkins, the reports mentioned how a foetus responds to selective music by 38 weeks of the gestation period. It shows how music comprehension advances before the basic learning one grows through after birth.
Music cognition evolves before one’s birth thus corroborating the fact that music does not only help develop the sensory stimulation but also aids the individual to express certain emotions that are difficult to decode with the basic language syntax but can be expressed effortlessly with the musical syntax.
Music shapes the overall experience of an individual that makes him/her act in guidance to one’s intelligence, thus making the individual grow in awareness of their conscious being. Music has many psychological benefits such as improvising one’s cognitive performance, acting as a stress buster in times of mental & emotional imbalance, sharpens memory, helps decipher and manage pain & other emotions, comes across as a sleeping aid, gives that motivational push and is a mood stabilizer in times of heightened tension. Music enhances all the sensory receptors and it shouldn’t be a surprise for you at this turn to know that out of all the senses to be physically developed, one’s aural sense is the first to be stimulated by music. Thus, music enhances the development of the brain and its functioning way before one’s learning period. Overall, one can say that music is an echo of one’s emotional expression.
~ By Sheryl Shaji
[A South Indian hailing from Gujjuland with no taste or accent for stereotypes. Has an uncanny way of sticking to pertinent details and is the perfect example of ‘Calm amidst the Chaos’ switching to either of them as per the situation.]
