Music Therapy Mash Up

“Music is particularly known for its effectiveness in triggering moods” (Sweeney 1).  Mei-Yueh Chang with “Effects of music therapy on psychological health of women during pregnancy”, Anonymous with “Music and Emotions”, and Jillian C. Sweeney with “The Role of Cognitions and Emotions in the Music-Approach-Avoidance Behavior Relationship” all give positive feedback on the theory of music therapy, or the influence music has on emotions.  Although all three articles claim that music can influence your emotions, they conduct different experiments and arrive at this conclusion differently.  Chang tested the effectiveness of music on pregnant Taiwanese women and had them listen to a soothing type of music for 30 minutes every day. For Anonymous’ experiment, students were split up into two equal groups: Half percussion and the other half included students who did not learn to play and instrument.  The most informative article by Sweeney tested the same theory of music therapy by testing genre and tempo in retail stores and recording the reaction of the subjects.  These articles are similar because they all arrive at the same conclusion, but it is hard to say they are similar because they are testing different factors.

Chang’s “Effects of music therapy…” and Anonymous’ “Music and Emotions” are somewhat similar to each other while still having significant differences.  Both conduct a study on random candidates and test levels of emotional, physical, and psychological well being.  Chang’s experiments were more thorough than Anonymous’.  Apart from his main experiment, where he had 121 Taiwanese women listen to classical music, nature sounds, a lullaby, or crystal music performing Chinese children’s rhymes and songs for 30 minutes every day, he also arranged a side experiment.  In this small study he chose 20 women in labor; 13 of the women listened to music while in labor and delivery while the other 7 did not.  The 13 women who listened to music while giving birth “reported significant [reduced] anxiety and level of pain or discomfort during childbirth” (Chang 2581).  This side experiment is an important support for his theory.  Not only did Chang conduct one successful study, but he arranged a second study to support his theory. Listening to music while in delivery is a good test of stress because since labor is possibly one of the most painful and stressful actions a woman can go through, you can compare one woman’s pain and stress who is listening to music with another woman going through labor who is not currently listening to music.  The negative factor to take into consideration is the fact that people have different tolerances for pain and also there really is no efficient way to measure an individual’s pain without taking their word for it.  Anonymous’ experiment consisted of splitting up a classroom of preschoolers teaching one half of the class some notes on percussion instruments while the other half went without any musical teaching.  Both groups of preschoolers took two skills tests, in which on both tests, the children who learned percussion instruments scored higher on both skills tests than their peers.  “Music trains the brain for higher levels of thinking and it helps people absorb, retain, and retrieve information.  Music, even in the form of basic lessons to preschoolers, has the power to modify the brain and its function for the better” (Anonymous 1).  In Chang’s article, they also introduce the limitations to the main experiment such as the subjects did not maintain a diary, how they feel could depend on what they were doing while they were listening to the music, and overall the study itself lacked control. 

Sweeney’s “The Role of Cognition and Emotions in the Music-Approach-Avoidance Behavior Relationship” outshines both the Music and Emotions article and Chang’s article because of how well this article argues the theory of music therapy.  Unlike Music and Emotions which had absolutely no graphs or charts at all, Sweeney’s article has more than enough supporting information.  In the experiment conducted, Sweeney tested different types of music at retail stores to see which type of music made the consumer more likely to buy the specified retail stores’ merchandise.  This article is a reliable source because there are so many graphs and charts collected together to support their thesis that tempo and genre do have an effect on the consumers’ emotional states and cognitive pressing if they are listening to music while shopping.  I agree with their theory because whatever music you are currently listening to will have an effect on the emotions being felt.  What makes Sweeney’s article stronger than the others is the fact that refutation paragraphs added.  This gives Sweeney the chance to introduce the opposing view, but more importantly a chance to fight it which she does extremely well.  She states why she believes she is correct and proves why the opposing opinions are incorrect and she does this by showing multiple graphs and charts for tempo and genre.  Even more impressive is how easy to read her charts and graphs are.  Out of the three articles, this would be the best article to use to support your argument that music therapy is an effective alternative treatment.  This article really only has one main drawback being that it has a handful of extraneous information.

All three articles greatly support how music changes your emotions and the calming effects of a certain tempo or genre.  It is shown in Chang’s article that even though depression is common in pregnant women, listening to music can actually lower your levels of stress and anxiety.  This conclusion was drawn after several tests had been conducted to test this theory such as the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), the State Scale if the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (S-STAI) and the EPDS test.  The article “Music and Emotions” proved that musical students actually perform better overall and that it increases abilities to concentrate, learn, and understand in children with Autism.  This article also contained the interesting fact that an NIU music professor was actually able to teach students with Parkinson’s disease to play the harp leading them to feel more confident.  Listening to music and playing an instrument can help maintain and improve emotional, physical, and psychological well being while also improving coordination, memory, and the ability to decrease stress.  Sweeney’s articles’ strongpoint was the fact of not what it proved, but how well it was proven.  Her article contained so much detail and supports compared to the other paragraph which is why it is unarguably the most credible article.  By addressing both sides of the argument, there really is not much more room for question after she covered it all.  She explained that tempo and genre do affect your mood using four different types of graphs so it could be easily understood by any type of audience reading the article.

Mei-Yueh Chang’s “Effects of Music Therapy on Psychological Health of Women during Pregnancy”, Anonymous’ “Music and Emotions” and Jillian C. Sweeney’s “The Role of Cognition and Emotions in the Music-Approach-Avoidance Behavior Relationship” all are great pieces of information that can be used to argue that music does have an effect on a person’s well being and state of mind even though “Music and Emotions”, especially, could have used more detail and supporting arguments.  As stated before, Sweeney’s article would be the best supporting article out of the three that argues that music does have an effect on the individual’s well being.

Works Cited

1.)    "Music and Emotions." My Own Little World. Web. 06 Feb. 2012. 

2.)    Chang, Mei-Yueh, Chung-Hey Chen, and Kuo-Feng Huang. "Effects of Music Therapy on Psyhcological Health of Women During Pregnancy." EBSCO Publishing Service Selection Page. Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.

3.)    Jillian C. Sweeney, Fiona Wyber, (2002) "The role of cognitions and emotions in the music-approach-avoidance behavior relationship", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 16 Iss: 1, pp.51 - 69

The Role of Cognitions and Emotions in the Music-Approach-Avoidance Behavior Relationship

Music is all around you; when you are walking down the street, standing in an elevator, doing your grocery shopping, or taking you children back to school clothes shopping.  You would be surprised that even though you are hearing the music and not necessarily listening to it, it will still have an effect on how you are feeling during the day. 

In “The Role of Cognitions and Emotions in the Music-Approach-Avoidance Behavior Relationship” by authors Jillian C. Sweeney and Fiona Wyber, their main goal in this article is to test the effect of two characteristics of music, tempo and genre, on consumers’ emotional states, cognitive processing, and to determine the emotional states and cognitive processing on intended in-store behaviors.  This also happens to be the thesis statement in the article. Even though there is not a clear context, the subject of music on consumers’ emotional states and the claim hoping to be able to determine the emotional states and cognitive processing on intended behaviors in stores.  This is a very well written thesis statement that does fully connect to the article and the supports given after it.  One drawback is that the audience this article was written for, meaning the diction that has been chosen, suggests that this article was written for a more scholarly audience by using some phrases that our peers would not be quite sure of.

The claim of this article is suggesting that if you do play music while people are shopping, say in a grocery store, or a mall, that it will have an effect on that person’s mood whether it is positive or negative.  Based on personal opinion, I agree with the point their thesis statement is trying to make. In previous articles I have written about, they all state that music can influence your mood, well-being, and performance.  This statement supports what I believe.  I also believe that I think they did really well showing evidence of their argument.  There are a lot of tables, graphs, and charts to support their evidence.  For example, in Figure 1, it models the relationship between music, cognitive processing, and emotional states and approach-avoidance behaviors.  The difference from this table and other tables in opposing articles is the simplicity of this article.  It is made extremely easy to read and understand.

There is a lot of information supporting their idea and about a couple paragraphs refuting the idea that music influences a person’s mood.  These refutation paragraphs make the paper stronger because it gives the authors a chance to argue with their peers who have opposite beliefs. 

For example, in Figure 2, to test the effectiveness in music while shopping, one graph in particular constructed by Sweeney and Wyber tested pleasure and arousal and service quality and merchandise quality.  They also tested the subject’s being tested how they felt when they listened to Tempo 0, or music with a slower tempo, and Tempo 1, music with a faster tempo to see which type of music caused a certain type of emotion.  This graph also tested two types of genres, top 40 and classical music.  After both the results of the tempos and the genres were recorded, they tested them against each other to see if they corresponded with each other.  The results were that they did, tempo 0 corresponded with classical music where as Tempo 1 corresponded to top 40 music.  Even though this was shown in graph 2, it is shown in other tables throughout the articles as well.  I believe that this article argues their belief extremely well with a lot of details, evidence, and by the way it was written.  Without any grammatical errors in this article, it is a very well written article filled with lots of useful information and experiments to support it.

The results of this article and experiment showed a number of helpful things to store managers to get their customers more interested in buying their products.  Research from this experiment revealed that if the customers liked the music playing in stores, they were more likely to feel aroused and praise the quality of the service and also merchandise of the store they were at.  These experiments also show that the majority of shoppers enjoyed listening to slow top 40 music.  Top 40 music, with a slower tempo, seemed to make the customers more talkative and friendlier to strangers and staff.  Finally and most importantly, store owners should avoid mixing tempos and genres for one specific store.  The goal is to try and pick music that their customers will like, not necessarily are familiar with.

Music creates an atmosphere for where ever you are, whether it is at the store, restaurant, or on the train.  I believe this article would greatly help out someone who was struggling to open up a new business or to “spice up” an old business.  Music creates an environment “in which sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch act together to create a powerful and consistent image that cannot be attained from one sense alone” (19).

WORKS CITED

1.)  Jillian C. Sweeney, Fiona Wyber, (2002) "The role of cognitions and emotions in the music-approach-avoidance behavior relationship", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 16 Iss: 1, pp.51 - 69

Effects of Music Therapy on Psychological Health of Women During Pregnancy

It is believed that listening to music can help reduce stress.  Chang’s article, “Effects of music therapy on psychological health of women during pregnancy” tests the theory of music therapy on pregnant Taiwanese women, all in their second or third trimester of pregnancy, to see if the theory holds.  Mei-Yueh Chang, Chung-Hey Chen, and Kuo-Feng Huang conducted an experiment to test this theory by getting the consent of 121 pregnant women to be split into two groups. 

To avoid between-group contamination, the number of participants per group was chosen by block randomization. This was executed by giving each person a ball either marked “E” for experimental group of “C” for control group.  Group one, or the experimental group, listened daily to 30 minutes of classical music, nature sounds, a lullaby, or crystal music performing Chinese children’s rhymes and songs.  The participants also wrote in a journal where they described what type of song they listened to and what they were doing.  Group two, the control group, just received the general prenatal care.  Chang states that “The aesthetic pleasure received by the right brain [that can be received by listening to music] can release endorphins from the pituitary gland, thereby decreasing the concentration of adrenocorticotrophic hormone in the blood” (Chang 25810). 

To test the results of this experiment, the participant’s PSS scores were collected along with their S-STAI scores and EPDS scores, or in other words the Perceived Stress Scale, State Scale of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, and depression.  In all three tests, women in the experimental group generally had lower scores than the control group.  Music Therapy is an effective alternative to lessen the amount of pain, decrease psychological stress, and mental distress caused by pregnancy for people who feel uncomfortable taking medication or for any other reason.  Another side study was also conducted involving thirteen women who listened to music while in labor and delivery compared with seven women who gave birth without listening to music. The thirteen women who listened to music all reported significantly lower levels of anxiety, pain, and discomfort. 

          This study also has several limitations that are listed as such.  To avoid the Hawthorne effect, the control group did not maintain a diary.  “Therefore, comparisons of the amount of time and type of music listened to were limited (2586).”  A second limitation was that whatever the participants were doing while listening to music could have influenced their mood and emotions.  The main limitation in the study is the factor that while doing whatever task they were working on while listening to the music, there is the possibility that the participants may have sit down or rested while listening to music resulting in a more relaxed feeling.  It is concluded that to draw a more firm conclusion, more control is needed.  The presence of these limitations show that this article is not bias argument because it gives both the positives of the experiment, and the faults that could have been changed to make it a more precise collection of data.

          The ending results overall of this experiment supported the use of music therapy.   Listening just for thirty minutes a day made the women feel less stressed, lower levels of anxiety, and also lower levels of depression.  Music greatly influences how people feel and what different emotions they experience.  This study is a great support of that theory and also how music can not only make you feel happier for a moment, but help turn that temporary happiness into long-term happiness.

WORKS CITED

1.)   Chang, Mei-Yueh, Chung-Hey Chen, and Kuo-Feng Huang. "Effects of Music Therapy on Psyhcological Health of Women During Pregnancy." EBSCO Publishing Service Selection Page. Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2012. <http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=fff4cf00-cb70-4477-bf7b-555d1a993f09@sessionmgr4>

Music And Emotions Summary

I believe that you can change your mood, not by the flip of a switch, but just by changing the song you are currently listening to.  The type of music you listen to influence your mood and how you are feeling whether the song you are listening to makes you happy, sad, or excited.  I read the article “Music and Emotions” which stated the already well known fact that children tend to perform better than their non-musical classmates.  Even though most people do not know why, it is a known fact that music encourages creativity and has an increasingly positive effect on learning and intelligence.  This all has to do with the chemicals that are being released by the brain when you hear music.  

A study was conducted where they split a classroom of students in half; one half learned some percussion instruments while the other half did not learn anything new to do with music.  The two groups of students both took two skills tests.  The results were that both times the children who played an instrument did significantly better.  The article states that “music trains the brain for higher levels of thinking, and it helps people absorb, retain, and retrieve information.”  Music is a great way to calm yourself down.  It can serve as a distraction and give a sense of control and also stimulate the production of endorphins.  Music, universally, has become and accepted treatment for calming the mind and body.  In studies, music has also increase the abilities to concentrate, learn, and understand especially for people with Autism and help them to lead normal and fulfilling lives.  When a song alters your mood, or changes how you feel, that song is stimulating the production of hormones.  

This article also states that an hour of soothing classical music actually possesses the same effect as a 10mg of valium.  The harp is actually one of the most calming sounds accessible to the human ear.  A Northern Illinois University music professor actually taught students with Parkinson’s disease to play the harp.  It is also shown that Baroque music can stimulate portions in the brain dealing with memory, comprehension, and general learning.  Music imitating the human heartbeat can also relax muscle tensions, lower stress, decrease blood pressure, and equalize respiration according to Krasner-Khait.  

There are many benefits to listening to music and also music therapy.  Listening to music has shown to aid the development of motor skills.  Whether it is playing a certain instrument or just clapping to the beat of a song can nourish the development of motor skills and body coordination.  Another benefit is that people involved in music therapy have shown to gain more confidence.  Learning simple instruments and learning to sing a song can instill a sense of confidence in patients and also participating in any activity dealing with music or singing gives a sense of talent or accomplishment. Also, you have known since you were younger, a slow song or a lullaby can literally put a person to sleep, which is another benefit.  You do not need sleeping pills or Nyquil to fall asleep, just a nice, slow, relaxing song.  Music therapy, or the prescribed use of music to maintain and improve emotional, physical, and psychological well being, can also be set up like a group therapy session.  They can move from energetic to calm songs and can possibly include singing and then transition to various listening and reacting activities.  

Reading this article really expanded my knowledge on how music really is important in your day to day life.  It can excite you when you are happy or calm you down if you are feeling sad or just want to fall asleep.  Music therapy sessions also have proven to be extremely profitable to anyone who takes these sessions.  It helps your coordination, memory, and decrease stress.  All around, it helps you strengthen your weakness to help you become a stronger and better person which is what we are all aiming to be.

WORKS CITED

1.)  "Music and Emotions." My Own Little World. Web. 06 Feb. 2012. <http://quinzavix.50megs.com/peracta/musicandemotions.html>.

Bass, Treble, Jess

Jim Morrison, lead singer for The Doors once said “Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes.  You are free.”  My name is Jessica Burnham.  I’m currently a freshman in college, and like any college student or person in general, I love music.  It has been a part of my life ever since I can remember and I can’t ever see that changing. I believe the lyrics to a song are the best way to see how people think and who they truly are, and nothing can compare to that.  My father, who died when I was 9, made music a huge part of his life which transferred over to me.  He played guitar and minored in music and he loved bands like The Doors, The Beatles, Grateful Dead, and probably owned every record ever made by them.  Growing up listening to this music and watching my dad struggle to perfect every song he played on the guitar made me see music in a completely different way and really appreciate it.  Music is poetry; I don’t believe you can compare different genres to each other because it’s like comparing other people’s experiences to one another.  Music is about how the words make you feel with the melody in the background to go with it; it is a beautiful thing.  I believe writing music and poetry is one of the best ways to look at yourself in a new perspective to help you grow.  Whenever I was upset, I used to write lyrics down, even if it was just a line or two, and it felt like I was writing down whatever bad feeling I was feeling, and leaving it right there on the paper so I didn’t have to carry around those negative feelings anymore.  Looking back on it years later, I can look at those two short lines and remember exactly how I was feeling and what I was thinking when I wrote those lyrics down.  Only I knew what they meant, but to other people, it’s up to interpretation which is another amazing quality about music.  The process of writing lyrics and putting it to a melody with such meaning to where it can really make you think or change your mood and make you feel like dancing is the most interesting thing to me.  I realized this when one day when I was sitting outside of a restaurant in a terrible mood and a Journey song came on and I instantly felt better.  The way music makes you feel, emotionally and scientifically, is my main point in my blogs I will be posting.  No, I do not plan to major in music, or mix it, but I like to say that I listen to so many varieties that I can really appreciate everything from rap to opera and everything in between.  I cannot honestly think of a genre I think is better than the other.  Music is music and it is beautiful.