Music and mood
Music can affect your mood in many ways. This is because of the rhythm and tone that we hear when we listen to music. When we listen to a rhythm, our heart actually begins to synch with it. A slow heartbeat with a strong diastolic pressure tells our brain that something sad or depressing is occurring. Very fast beating has to do with excitement, while a dreamy rhythm with occasional upbeats can be a sign of love or joy. Tones are just as important as rhythm. A “major key” music piece will usually signal cheerful communication to our brain, while “minor key” pieces are sadder. This all has a very strong effect on our brain, which makes our mind actually feel what’s being communicated to us.
When we listen to joyful, happy music, our brains usually produce chemicals such as serotonin and dopamine, which make us feel happy. The same happens when we listen to relaxing, soothing music or to hard, loud, angry music that can also cause a number of different emotional feelings. Music may cause you to feel joyful, sad, angry, hyped up, relaxed etc. and sometimes you can feel more than one emotion during a song.
When we listen to joyful, happy music, our brains usually produce chemicals such as serotonin and dopamine, which make us feel happy. The same happens when we listen to relaxing, soothing music or to hard, loud, angry music that can also cause a number of different emotional feelings. Music may cause you to feel joyful, sad, angry, hyped up, relaxed etc. and sometimes you can feel more than one emotion during a song.
As research shows, music not only effects what kind of mood we may be in, but we also seem to have a habit of choosing music based on the moods we are already feeling. So if we are feeling very happy, sorrowful, angry etc. we will generally want to listen to that type of music. However, if you feel like you are falling into picking certain music that makes a negative mood worse, you should be aware of what type of music can help reverse the negative mood you feel instead of encouraging it.
Music has recently been seen as beneficial for depression recovery, however, according to research it does depend on the type of music: Classical and meditative sounds seem to be uplifting, while heavy metal and techno can actually make depressive symptoms worse.
Music has recently been seen as beneficial for depression recovery, however, according to research it does depend on the type of music: Classical and meditative sounds seem to be uplifting, while heavy metal and techno can actually make depressive symptoms worse.
Music also affects our mood to the extent that it can influence how we see neutral faces. One study showed that after hearing a short piece of music, participants were more likely to interpret a neutral expression as happy or sad, to match the tone of the music they heard. This also happened with other facial expressions, but was most notable for those that were close to neutral. Something else that’s really interesting about how our emotions are affected by music is that there are two kinds of emotions related to music: perceived emotions and felt emotions. This means that sometimes we can understand the emotions of a piece of music without actually feeling them, which explains why some of us find listening to sad music enjoyable, rather than depressing. Unlike in real life situations, we don’t feel any real threat or danger when listening to music, so we can perceive the related emotions without really feeling them.