One or more pieces of music consistently give you goosebumps? You thought that was common? Not necessarily, according to a team of researchers from the University of Southern California (United States) in a study published in the scientific journal Oxford Academic.
A brain more prone to feeling emotions
For the purposes of their study, the researchers examined the brain activity of 20 students, 10 of whom reported having felt goosebumps while listening to music. Using a scanner, the scientists compared the brain structures of the two groups as they listened to a song. This revealed that their brains did not respond in the same way.
Participants who were prone to feeling strong emotions that trigger goosebumps had a higher density of connections between their auditory cortex and the brain areas known to be the seat of emotions. According to the researchers, this would explain why these individuals were more likely to react intensely to listening to music.
If you’ve ever gotten goosebumps at the sound of a song, especially right from the first notes, then your brain is “special”!
Why do some music affect us emotionally more than others?
Another study, this time conducted in France by neuroscientists from the University of Burgundy Franche-Comté, looked at what exactly happens in our brains when listening to music we particularly love. Published in the journal Frontiers in Neuroscience, it involved 18 participants, all music lovers who reported feeling intense emotions thanks to music.
The participants, comfortably seated, were asked to close their eyes while listening to five musical excerpts chosen beforehand by themselves. After listening, the volunteers had to indicate on a remote control the emotions they felt. At the same time, the researchers monitored the brain activity using electroencephalography (EEG).
Evidence showed that when reading the passages rated most appreciated by the participants, there was a dopamine hit detectable in their brains. Pleasure triggered by the surge in activity in the orbitofrontal cortex (the emotional processing area), the supplementary motor area (the movement-control region), and the right temporal lobe (which helps us enjoy music by processing auditory information). Activated together, these three regions trigger a kind of “reward”: a substantial release of dopamine, the pleasure hormone.
That led the researchers to conclude that music is “essential in human life” and deserves to be studied more extensively.
Music to treat depression and other conditions
The team of American researchers has also launched additional work to deepen the topic. Their aim: to demonstrate that music can treat depression, or at least help ease its symptoms.
For Matthew Sachs, a leading researcher behind the study, listening to music could stimulate emotion-related brain areas; enough to make people with depression feel sensations again. For, as several studies have shown, a person with depression often cannot feel the small joys of daily life.
Music is already used therapeutically in other medical fields beyond psychiatry, such as geriatrics, neurology and cardiology. It has already been shown, during a surgical procedure, that listening to a piece of music meaningful to a patient can help reduce their stress. The same during childbirth, where pregnant women can feel a welcome sense of well-being, helping them manage contractions better. Another benefit of music in medicine: it could help cancer patients strengthen their immune defenses. In short, if music is known to soften moods, it can do much more, and many of its benefits are still to be discovered!
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