Sometimes, when I’ve had a rough day, I’ll turn on some happy music and all of a sudden (only 2 minutes and 36 seconds later), I feel ten times better! Has that ever happened to you? It’s a fascinating phenomenon and can be understood by the way different music genres can affect mood.
Before we dive into that topic, let’s first understand what mood actually is. In this study, mood is defined as a long-lasting emotional state that isn’t usually directed at one event. Unlike emotions, moods are less intense and can last anywhere from minutes to days. Emotions usually have a clear trigger and last a short amount of time. Mood can be described as the “emotional background” that colors how we think and experience the world. Mood can influence many things, including attention, memory, decision-making, motivation, and social behavior. There are many things that can affect mood, like lack of sleep, increased stress, exercise (in a good way!), hormones, social interactions, and especially music.
So how do different genres affect mood? Well, in this study, researchers studied the difference in mood between those who listened to Classical music vs. Heavy Metal. Ninety university students participated, and researchers measured positive vs. negative affect and musical preference. The researchers did find that different genres produced different mood changes, and preference was one of the strongest predictors of mood. Essentially, people generally experienced a more positive mood when listening to music they liked. Despite what you might think, Heavy Metal did not automatically create negative moods, nor did Classical music automatically improve mood. Enjoyment of the music was what mattered more than the genre alone. So if you’ve ever heard people saying that “classical music relaxes everyone” or “metal makes people angry,” you now know that simply isn’t true! People’s preferences strongly influence how music affects them.
This idea was previously studied by Knight et al. in 2001. In this study,144 adults participated in listening to four different types of music: Grunge rock, Classical, New Age, and Designer music (music that was specifically created for relaxation). Each participant listened to the music for 15 minutes, and researchers then measured mood, tension, fatigue, relaxation, mental clarity, vigor, and hostility in the participants. The results were very interesting! Grunge rock increased tension, fatigue, sadness, and hostility and, subsequently, decreased relaxation, vigor, and mental clarity. The music designed for relaxation increased relaxation (shocking, I know!), caring, vigor, and mental clarity, all while reducing sadness, hostility, tension, and fatigue. Classical music had mixed results, as it helped some participants but not all of them, proving once again that genre may not necessarily matter, but rather preference. New Age music experienced increased relaxation, improvements in mood, some improvement in mental clarity, as well as reduced tension and feelings of sadness. In this study, the “designer music” produced the greatest improvements across nearly all mood measures, showing that music that was designed for a certain outcome can, in fact, invoke that outcome.
Overall, the research shows that while different genres can influence our mood, they don’t affect everyone in the same way. Musical features like tempo, rhythm, and volume all play a role, but perhaps most importantly, so do our own personal preferences and experiences. So the next time someone tells you that one genre is “better” than another, remember that the science says it’s much more personal than that. The music that lifts your mood might not be the same music that lifts someone else’s, and that’s one of the most wonderful things about music.
