music
Music training has biological impact on aging process
Age-related delays in neural timing are not inevitable and can be avoided or offset with musical training, according to the first study to provide biological evidence that lifelong musical experience impacts the aging process. Measuring automatic brain responses of younger and older musicians and non-musicians to speech sounds, researchers found older musicians not only outperformed older non-musicians, they also encoded sound stimuli as quickly and accurately as younger non-musicians.
Headphone music eases anxiety during prostate biopsies
Tuning in to tune out may be just what's needed for men undergoing a prostate biopsy, according to researchers.
Listening to music can be effective for reducing pain in high-anxiety persons
Distraction is an effective pain reliever, and a new study concludes that listening to music can be effective for reducing pain in high-anxiety persons who can easily become absorbed in cognitive activities.
Listening to music lights up the whole brain
Researchers have developed a groundbreaking new method that allows to study how the brain processes different aspects of music, such as rhythm, tonality and timbre (sound color) in a realistic listening situation.
Playing music alters the processing of multiple sensory stimuli in the brain
Piano practicing fine tunes the brain circuitries that temporally bind signals from our senses. Over the years pianists develop a particularly acute sense of the temporal correlation between the movements of the piano keys and the sound of the notes played. However, they are no better than non-musicians at assessing the synchronicity of lip movements and speech. Researchers have now discovered that pianists are significantly more accurate than the non-musicians in assessing whether the finger movements on the piano and the sounds heard coincided temporally or not.
Alcohol brand appearances in US popular music
Aims The average US adolescent is exposed to 34 references to alcohol in popular music daily. Although brand recognition is an independent, potent risk factor for alcohol outcomes among adolescents, alcohol brand appearances in popular music have not been assessed systematically. We aimed to determine the prevalence of and contextual elements associated with alcohol brand appearances in US popular music.Design Qualitative content analysis.Setting We used Billboard Magazine to identify songs to which US adolescents were most exposed in 2005–07.
Music professor analyzes the demographic profile of US high school music ensemble students
Scientists have been working to construct a national demographic profile of high school band, choir, and orchestra students in the US using evidence from the 2004 follow-up wave of the Education Longitudinal Study.
Music reduces anxiety in cancer patients
Cancer patients may benefit from sessions with trained music therapists or from listening to music. A new systematic review shows using music can reduce anxiety in cancer patients, and may also have positive effects on mood, pain and quality of life.