Orchestrating the Brain: The Cognitive and Therapeutic Power of Music
Orchestrating the Brain: The Cognitive and Therapeutic Power of Music
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[00:00:00] Uh, uh uh. Welcome to Psyber.Space. I'm your host, Leslie Poston. Today, we're talking about one of my favorite topics: how music impacts our brains.
Music is a universal language that touches us all, but it's power goes far beyond just making us feel good. Emerging research in psychology and neuroscience is revealing just how much music can shape our brain, boost our cognitive ability, and even help treat conditions like ADHD or dementia. One of the pioneers in this field is the neurologist Oliver sacks. In his book, "Musicophilia", he dives deep into the ways music can affect the brain, sharing fascinating stories of patients who have used music to overcome neurological challenges. For example, he describes how people with Parkinson's disease, who often [00:01:00] struggle with movement and speech, can suddenly sing or dance when they hear familiar tunes. It's as if music is a backdoor to your brain, bypassing damaged areas and unlocking hidden abilities or long forgotten memories. But you don't have to have a brain disorder to benefit from music. Plenty of studies have shown that music can enhance cognitive skills in healthy people too.
Take the famous Mozart effect. The idea that listening to classical music contemporarily boosts spatial reasoning. While the effect is often overhyped, there's no denying that music can put our brains in a more focused, receptive state. If you really want to give your brain a workout try learning an instrument. You don't even have to get good at it! The training itself is beneficial to your brain. Gottfried Schlaug, a neurologist at Harvard, has found that musical training can actually change the structure of your brain. In one study, he compared the brains of professional musicians to non-musicians and found [00:02:00] that the musicians had more gray matter in areas involved in hearing and fine motor control. He also found that the earlier someone started playing an instrument, the bigger the effect.
What if classical music isn't your thing? No worries, other genres can give your brain a boost as well. One recent study found that listening to Baroque music, with its complex harmonies and rhythms, improved short-term memory and problem solving skills. And research has shown that people who regularly listened to any kind of music tend to have better verbal memory processing speed and attention than those who don't. Want to try it for yourself? If you have ADHD, for example, head over to YouTube and look for one of the free playlists called binaural beats. Listen to one while you work and you might find that you focus better and get more tasks accomplished.
So, what is it about music that makes it such a powerful brain changer? Neuroscientist Daniel Levitin, author of "this is your brain [00:03:00] on music," explains that making or listening to music engages practically every area of the brain we've mapped so far. It's like a full body workout for the mind. Music taps into our emotions, our memories, our sense of rhythm and movement. It's social, it's creative, and it engages our deepest sense of self, often hitting core memories from our youth. And here's the cool part. You don't have to be a virtuoso to reap these cognitive rewards from music.
One recent study found that older adults who had played an instrument for at least 10 years performed better on tests of memory and cognitive flexibility than non-musicians- even if they hadn't picked up their instrument in decades. Just a little musical training, it seems, can have benefits that lasts a lifetime. This'll be good news for every mother that made their kid practice piano when they didn't want to. Music's power doesn't stop at boosting normal brain function. It can also help heal the injured brain. Miriam Sachs and her colleagues [00:04:00] found that patients who incorporated music therapy into their rehabilitation after a stroke or brain injury showed greater improvements in speech production and memory than those who received rehab without music. It's like the rhythms and melodies provided a scaffolding for the brain to rebuild damaged networks.
And music isn't just good for individual brains, it can enhance teamwork and creativity when people make music together. Organizational psychologist Theresa Lesniak found that listening to music at work can boost mood and productivity, especially for people in non creative fields like software design. And a recent study by Salvatore Sanseverino and colleagues found that teams who listen to upbeat music during a brainstorming session come up with more original ideas and reported feeling more positive about their group's performance.
Perhaps some of the most promising research on music and the brain is happening in the realm of neurological and psychiatric disorders. Tomaino, a pioneer in the field of [00:05:00] music therapy, has seen the power of familiar songs unlock memories and abilities and people with advanced Alzheimer's disease. Even when verbal communication has all but disappeared, many patients can still sing, dance are connect to the music they love and the memories they have with people from earlier times in their life. And it's not just about soothing the symptoms. There's evidence that music may actually slow the progression of dementia. Raglio and his team in Italy have found that regular music therapy sessions can improve cognitive function, language skills, and even reduce the need for anti-psychotic drugs in people with dementia. The social and emotional benefits are powerful too. Patients who participate in group singing or instrument playing often show reduced agitation, apathy, and depression.
For people with ADHD music might offer a drug-free way to improve focus and impulse control. This is great news right now, as we all know that [00:06:00] ADHD medications are under a shortage. A study by Mrazova and Celec found that listening to music during a cognitive task helped people with ADHD perform better, perhaps by providing a consistent rhythmic structure to guide their attention. A recent randomized controlled trial by Kramer and colleagues found that regular musical therapy sessions, especially those that involved active music making, significantly improved attention and reduced hyperactivity in kids with ADHD compared to those who received standard care alone. Neuroscientist Patel has proposed a theory for why music has such far reaching effects on the brain. His OPERA hypothesis suggests that music's benefits come from the fact that it engages and challenges the brain in five key ways. It Overlaps with language processing. It requires Precision. It evokes Emotion. It Repeats. And it demands Attention. By [00:07:00] providing such a rich multisensory workout music may enhance the brain's ability to learn and adapt in other domains. This idea is at the heart of neurologic music therapy, a field that uses music to rehabilitate motor speech and cognitive function after brain injury or illness. Pioneered by Thaut and others, NMT Involves using specific musical exercises to retrain the brain and activate new neural pathways. One technique, rhythmic auditory stimulation, uses metronomes and musical beats to help patients with Parkinson's or a stroke regain a steady walking gate. Another, melodic intonation therapy, uses singing to help people with aphasia relearn speech. The key is to harness the innate power of music to engage and reshape the brain. So how can we bring more of music's brain boosting power into our own lives? The research offers some clues. For mental focus and flow, instrumental [00:08:00] music with a steady rhythm seems to work best, then classical, ambient, or electronic genres. For emotional regulation and stress relief, singing or playing an instrument can be incredibly effective, as can listening to personally meaningful music. And for keeping the aging brain sharp, the more varied and socially engaging the musical activity the better. Join a choir, take a drumming class, or just crank up your favorite songs and dance or take a long drive. Your brain will thank you.
Of course music isn't a panacea. It won't cure Alzheimer's or make ADHD disappear. But as part of a holistic approach to brain health and wellness, it offers a powerful, accessible, and deeply pleasurable tool. In the words of Oliver Sacks, "Music can move us to the heights or depths of emotion. It can persuade us to buy something, or remind us of our first date. It can lift us out of depression when nothing else can and get us dancing to it's beat. But the power of music goes much, much [00:09:00] further. Indeed music occupies more areas of our brain than language does. Humans are a musical species."
As we continue to unravel the mysteries of the musical brain, one thing is clear- music is more than just entertainment. It's a fundamental part of who we are as humans. Woven into the very fabric of our cognition, our emotion, our relationships. By making music a bigger part of our lives by listening, by playing, by singing, dancing, and sharing we don't just make our brains healthier. We make our life richer, more vibrant and more connected. We tap into something ancient and profound, something that makes us feel- more alive, more human. So go ahead, put on your favorite song, lose yourself in the rhythm, and let melody carry you away. Your brain will be dancing right along with you, getting stronger and more resilient with every beat. That's the power of music. To touch us, move us, and change us from the inside out. Embrace it and let the music play on. [00:10:00] Thank you for listening to PsyberSpace.
I'm your host, Leslie Poston. I hope you enjoyed this episode about one of my personal favorite topics. It's a little short on the podcast episode, but there's going to be a companion blog post later this week that will also contain All of the sources for this podcast. be sure to check it out! Blog posts about PsyberSpace are hosted on MindMedia.Tech.
Thanks again for coming, and remember, stay curious. See you next week.
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