Cardiff, Wales—July 27, 2010— For decades research has shown that listening to music alleviates anxiety and depression, enhances mood, and can increase cognitive functioning, such as spatial awareness. However, until now, research has not addressed how we listen to music. For instance, is the cognitive benefit still the same if we listen to music whilst performing a task, rather than before it? Further, how does our preference for a particular type of music affect performance? A new study from Applied Cognitive Psychology shows that listening to music that one likes whilst performing a serial recall task does not help performance any more than listening to music one does not enjoy.
The researchers explored the 'irrelevant sound effect' by requiring participants to perform serial recall (recall a list of 8 consonants in presentation order) in the presence of five sound environments: quiet, liked music (e.g., Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Stranglers, and Arcade Fire), disliked music (the track "Thrashers" by Death Angel), changing-state (a sequence of random digits such as "4, 7, 1, 6") and steady-state ("3, 3, 3"). Recall ability was approximately the same, and poorest, for the music and changing-state conditions. The most accurate recall occurred when participants performed the task in the quieter, steady-state environments. Thus listening to music, regardless of whether people liked or disliked it, impaired their concurrent performance.
Lead researcher Nick Perham explains: "The poorer performance of the music and changing-state sounds are due to the acoustical variation within those environments. This impairs the ability to recall the order of items, via rehearsal, within the presented list. Mental arithmetic also requires the ability to retain order information in the short-term via rehearsal, and may be similarly affected by their performance in the presence of changing-state, background environments."
Although music can have a very positive effect on our general mental health, music can, in the circumstances described, also have negative effects on cognitive performance. Perham remarks, "Most people listen to music at the same time as, rather than prior to performing a task. To reduce the negative effects of background music when recalling information in order one should either perform the task in quiet or only listen to music prior to performing the task."
This study is published in the September 2010 issue of Applied Cognitive Psychology. Media wishing to receive a PDF of this article may contact scholarlynews@wiley.com.
To view the abstract for this article, please visit http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/123587968/abstract.
Article: "Can Preference for Background Music Mediate the Irrelevant Sound Effect?" Nick Perham, et. al.; Applied Cognitive Psychology; Published Online: July 20, 2010 (DOI: 10.1002/acp.1731).
Nick Perham is a Lecturer in the School of Psychology at the University of Wales Institute, Cardiff. He has published and presented widely on the effects of auditory distraction on short-term memory and general task performance.
About the Journal: Applied Cognitive Psychology seeks to publish the best papers dealing with psychological analyses of memory, learning, thinking, problem solving, language, and consciousness as they occur in the real world. Applied Cognitive Psychology is an official journal of the Society for Applied Research in Memory and Cognition (SARMAC). The aim of the Society is to promote the communication of applied research in memory and cognition within and between the applied and basic research communities. Professor Graham Davies is Applied Cognitive Psychology's Editor in Chief. Applied Cognitive Psychology can be accessed at http://www.interscience.wiley.com/journal/acp. For more information about SARMAC, please visit http://www.sarmac.org.
About Wiley-Blackwell: Wiley-Blackwell is the international scientific, technical, medical, and scholarly publishing business of John Wiley & Sons, with strengths in every major academic and professional field and partnerships with many of the world's leading societies. Wiley-Blackwell publishes nearly 1,500 peer-reviewed journals and 1,500+ new books annually in print and online, as well as databases, major reference works and laboratory protocols. For more information, please visit www.wileyblackwell.com or www.interscience.wiley.com.
Journal
Applied Cognitive Psychology