Music of the Hemispheres: Playing Instruments Gives Brains a Boost

While Alissa Quart in Extreme Parenting claims that Mozart effect is not helping the children to be smarter, however, music does somehow help the brain to function better in different areas. First, Rachel Ehrenberg says that music improves verbal and nonverbal skills. People who received music training for a certain of time have a better sense of sound detecting. They are better off at distinguishing between some specific sounds and background noises. Music transforms their nerves to be more sensitive when it comes to listening. Also, they have a better rythem than other people. In terms of verbal skills, music trained people are able to point out syntax errors within a piece of text or conversation due to their sensitivity. This is similar to when the musicians listen to a piece a music. They have ability to point out the error if a wrong note is being played. I think that’s why musicians are better at proofreading. And there is a study saying that music actually helps us to learn a new language. Musicians are better at telling the difference between mandarin syllables with no familiar Chinese knowledge. Although Mozart effect does not make people to become smarter, music enhances the sensitivity and the ability to distinguish unfamiliar objects. I think music stimulates the brain so that more unused parts of brain are developed. This is good for children while their brains are starting to grow. However, not all of the music is good for brain development. In the early stage of a child, it is inappropriate to ask them to listen to music like heavy metal since it may damage their brain. Pop songs do not really help to grow because its repetitive beats do not give them creativity, and the lyrics always are related to sex, drugs, partying and drinking. It most likely would bring negative influence to children when they are becoming teenagers. 

The Science of Hit Songs

In order to make a hit song, repetitive beats and catchy lyrics are two main necessary features.  Aside from the production aspect, the high popularity of a pop song is essential to create a success for the song. It is important for music listeners to constantly listen to a song so that the song would expose through different media more often. It seems that the key is to increase the people’s attention of a song. Based on the research of Matthew Salganik (2006), a sociologist at Columbia University, we know that music listeners’ music choice often influences by other exterior factors such as their friends and previous data of the songs. He conducted an experiment which he assigned two groups, “independent’ group and “social influence” group. The result shows that people with previous resources of a song would tend to pick the songs which more people listen to. He claims that since there are too many songs in the music world, people do not have time to listen to all of them. An easy way is to follow what others listen to in order to decide if they like it. Also, he mentions that hit songs are like a trend. They indicate what the most popular fashion and beats recently. Lots of people would choose to listen to the hit songs in order to communicate with their friends. I think it is reasonable because people’s taste does affect by the surroundings. For example, since we live in the same house and cook together everyday, my roommates and I are influencing each other in terms of living habit and eating taste. This all reflects that we are trying to convert ourselves to create a living style that is suitable for us. We sometimes did not even notice we changed under other people’s influence.