If you were to relax, would you choose to listen to the sound of a mountain stream or a song played on the piano? If you chose the first answer, you were wrong: according to what was discovered by a study published in PNASmusic is able to relieve stress more effectively than the sound of water, and it does not do so simply by masking it, but “by providing a structure that reorganizes the brain’s response to stress”, explain the authors.
The research involved 120 volunteers, who were subjected to timed arithmetic tests to put them under stress. In one of the experiments conducted, 30 participants listened to relaxing music and another 30 natural water sounds (streams, sea waves and the like) while the researchers monitored their heart rate, sweating, cortisol levels and mood. In another test, volunteers underwent brain scans to analyze communication between different brain regions.
Better music than natural sounds
The first test showed that those who listened to the music relaxed much faster than those who heard the sounds of water: sweating and heart rate decreased more quickly, cortisol levels were lower and mood improved significantly more.
Brain scans revealed that music changes the way the auditory cortex, the insula (responsible for body sensations) and the thalamus (which directs sensory information) communicate, allowing the brain to recover more quickly from stress.
The “when” is important
A central aspect of the research is the importance of choosing the right time to listen to music: doing it before a stressful moment changes nothing, and does not prevent tension. Music therefore acts as a natural calming agent: now all that remains is to conduct further studies to understand whether all musical genres are equally beneficial, or whether classical music and hard rock have different effects.
