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Can Music Therapy Prevent Cognitive Decline? What the Evidence Shows
We’re all curious about how music can be a neurological intervention for those with cognitive decline. Many of us have heard of something called “music therapy.” How can music help prevent cognitive decline in those with dementia and mild cognitive impairment (MCI)? How can it help overall executive function? In this meta-analysis by Ito et…
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Music Training and Executive Function: What Studies Show About Focus, Memory & Attention
How can music training throughout various periods of your life help fight against cognitive decline? How does music training actually strengthen your brain and help executive function? In this study, Bottcher et al. investigate the association between playing a musical instrument across various periods of your life and the various multi-domain cognitive abilities that are…
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Singing and the Brain: Cognitive and Emotional Benefits of Using Your Voice – Part 2
In our last article, we talked about the ways in which singing can help improve cognitive function in older adults with dementia. But what about the healthy? Does singing act as a preventative “medicine” for the healthy aging brain? This is part two of this article. Please refer back to the previously published article if…
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Singing and the Brain: Cognitive and Emotional Benefits of Using Your Voice – Part 1
We all love to sing, in some way or form, whether you are a choral or a cappella musician, a musical theater actor/actress, or simply someone who loves to sing along with the radio. But how can any type of singing affect the way your brain works? How does it benefit us? This article is…
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How Music Reduces Stress and Anxiety
Stress and Anxiety are two very unavoidable things in our world today; there is always something that will cause those two things. Some amount of stress and anxiety can be healthy to have, but how can music help us manage an excess of those emotions? Listening to music can already have a very clear effect…
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Neuroplasticity and Music: Can Music Change the Brain Long-Term?
Neuroplasticity can be defined as the brain’s remarkable ability to reorganize its structure, functions, and neural connections throughout life in response to experiences, learning, injury, or environmental changes, essentially allowing it to adapt, rewire, and form new pathways to develop new skills or recover lost functions. Scientists have discovered that playing music, and possibly even…
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Does Playing Music Affect the Brain Differently Than Listening? Here’s What the Research Shows
We’ve thought much about music listening in the past articles, but now it’s time to dive into the brains of musicians. How does being a musician affect the brain differently? In this meta-analysis, through analyzing many neuroimages to find out the differences between the brains of musicians and non-musicians, and how they react to music…
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How Music Can Regulate Stress and the Autonomic Nervous System
In the last article, I touched on music and how it affects your emotions – quite literally in your brain. But what about the other parts of the body? How can music help to regulate stress and your Nervous System? In a systematic search done by various scientists(link here), there were many studies uncovered relating…
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What Actually Happens in your Brain when you Listen to Music? Here’s What Research Shows
Music – a universal language. Something that can fight across many modern barriers. But how does your brain actually process music? And how can that be useful in medicine? This article is fairly technical – while there is much explanation, as I process these studies, I suggest looking up the basic brain structures and what…
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Music and Rewards: How Music Triggers Dopamine in the Brain
Dopamine is your brain’s way of telling you when it enjoys something. You’ve probably heard about dopamine in the media, but what exactly is dopamine, and how does music affect it? First off, what even is Dopamine? Dopamine is a chemical messenger in your brain that helps control feelings of pleasure, motivation, and reward. When…
Music is Medicine
A student led knowledge hub exploring the science of music and the brain.
