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Dancing to “groovy” music enhances the experience of flow
Abstract
We investigated whether dancing influences the emotional response to music, compared to when music is listened to in the absence of movement. Forty participants without previous dance training listened to “groovy” and “nongroovy” music excerpts while either dancing or refraining from movement. Participants were also tested while imitating their own dance movements, but in the absence of music as a control condition. Emotion ratings and ratings of flow were collected following each condition. Dance movements were recorded using motion capture. We found that the state of flow was increased specifically during spontaneous dance to groovy excerpts, compared with both still listening and motor imitation. Emotions in the realms of vitality (such as joy and power) and sublimity (such as wonder and nostalgia) were evoked by music in general, whether participants moved or not. Significant correlations were found between the emotional and flow responses to music and whole‐body acceleration profiles. Thus, the results highlight a distinct state of flow when dancing, which may be of use to promote well‐being and to address certain clinical conditions. We investigated whether dancing influences the emotional response to music, compared to when music is listened to in the absence of movement. We found that the state of flow was increased specifically during spontaneous dance to groovy excerpts, which may be of use to promote well‐being and to address certain clinical conditions.
... The motor and auditory systems of the human brain are narrowly interrelated and, in some instances, sounds are in fact translated into electrical signals that travel to the muscles and result in motor potentials (for important studies see: Paltsev and Elner, 1967;Xenos et al., 1976; but see also: Thaut et al., 1999, Thaut, 2003Molinari et al., 2003;Zatorre et al., 2007;Schmahmann and Pandya, 2009;Kornysheva et al., 2010;Cesari et al., 2014;Mainka, 2015;Olshansky et al., 2015;Poikonen et al., 2016). Thence, likely the human drive to groove along any rhythm that presents itself in our environment (Bernardi et al., 2018). ...
... This is different from the social cohesion effect that we discussed in point section "Dance Styles" in that connectedness refers to a subjective impression that happens during the dance itself (even measurable via physiological synchronization such as breathing patterns among dancers Codrons et al., 2014), though some of the studies reported about in section "Dance Domains" specifically included questionnaire measures about feelings connectedness and subsequent trust in their assessments (Wiltermuth and Heath, 2009;Tarr et al., 2015). According to subjective reports from dancers, the stronger the connection during the dance, the more pleasing is the whole experience (Duberg et al., 2016;Bernardi et al., 2018). Another shade of this connectedness is the emotional link between audience and dancer that becomes established during some performances. ...
... It is thus desirable to have flow moments in everyday life and dance has been proposed as an activity that produces flow (Vitebsky, 1995;Gore, 1997;Jeong, 2012). In particular, the feeling of "groove" during dancing has been found to be correlated with feelings of flow (Bernardi et al., 2018). Moreover, using imagery in dance practice increased the experience of flow (Jeong, 2012). ...
“Dance” has been associated with many psychophysiological and medical health effects. However, varying definitions of what constitute “dance” have led to a rather heterogenous body of evidence about such potential effects, leaving the picture piecemeal at best. It remains unclear what exact parameters may be driving positive effects. We believe that this heterogeneity of evidence is partly due to a lack of a clear definition of dance for such empirical purposes. A differentiation is needed between (a) the effects on the individual when the activity of “dancing” is enjoyed as a dancer within different dance domains (e.g., professional/”high-art” type of dance, erotic dance, religious dance, club dancing, Dance Movement Therapy (DMT), and what is commonly known as hobby, recreational or social dance), and (b) the effects on the individual within these different domains, as a dancer of the different dance styles (solo dance, partnering dance, group dance; and all the different styles within these). Another separate category of dance engagement is, not as a dancer, but as a spectator of all of the above. “Watching dance” as part of an audience has its own set of psychophysiological and neurocognitive effects on the individual, and depends on the context where dance is witnessed. With the help of dance professionals, we first outline some different dance domains and dance styles, and outline aspects that differentiate them, and that may, therefore, cause differential empirical findings when compared regardless (e.g., amount of interpersonal contact, physical exertion, context, cognitive demand, type of movements, complexity of technique and ratio of choreography/improvisation). Then, we outline commonalities between all dance styles. We identify six basic components that are part of any dance practice, as part of a continuum, and review and discuss available research for each of them concerning the possible health and wellbeing effects of each of these components, and how they may relate to the psychophysiological and health effects that are reported for “dancing”: (1) rhythm and music, (2) sociality, (3) technique and fitness, (4) connection and connectedness (self-intimation), (5) flow and mindfulness, (6) aesthetic emotions and imagination. Future research efforts might take into account the important differences between types of dance activities, as well as the six components, for a more targeted assessment of how “dancing” affects the human body.
... Literature [23] introduces a symbolic system for recording human movements, which can accurately perform motion capture and automatically generate scores in the data, which can reduce a large amount of manual labor and help the inheritance and development of dance. Literature [24] investigated the effect of music mood on participants with no dance training and recorded it using motion capture technology and found that the state of heart flow increased significantly when dancing to music. Literature [25] describes how a new dance piece by the Alexander Wheatley Dance Company was created using motion capture sensors to capture the dancers' movements and transmit the data to a computer, creating a series of visual effects. ...
... ( ) , S i j as the sum of all frame scores of the action sequence to be matched relative to the template action sequence, and use the length of the sequence to be matched n to find the weights as the final score of the action sequence for Eq. (24), and round the score results: ...
With the advancement of motion capture technology, its application in dance movement training has become increasingly prevalent. This study explores the use of real-time dynamic capture technology for the analysis and optimization of street dance movements. A street dance movement system based on real-time motion capture technology is designed. Initially, the data obtained from sensors are fused using the Extended Kalman Filtering gesture fusion algorithm to identify street dance movements. Subsequently, the gestures of the street dance movements are matched with template movements using the DTW algorithm, facilitating movement optimization. Finally, the system is scrutinized for its performance and application analysis. The number of concurrent users of the system is in the interval of [90,99], and the average response time for uploading street dance moves and street dance move evaluation is 7.631s and 0.35s, respectively, which basically meets the design objectives. The maximum error, average absolute error, and root mean square error of the pose angles solved by the algorithm in this paper do not exceed ±1.61°, 0.20°, and 0.25°, respectively, and the algorithm is highly accurate and smooth, which meets the requirements of pose solving. Through the evaluation of 12 training learning results of 6 testers, it is found that the movements of the testers are more and more similar to the template movements after several training sessions, which verifies that the system in this paper can guide the learners to learn and optimize the street dance movements.
... In their first study, Bernardi et al. (2017) found that participants reported higher ratings of induced pleasure when spontaneously dancing to high groove music, compared to listening to it staying still, and to dancing to low-groove music. In a follow up study, the same authors found that dancing to high groove music elicited stronger feelings of joy, power, and experiences of flow than staying still (Bernardi et al. 2018). ...
... Another possible explanation is that participants might have felt that the tapping instruction was too restrictive, and had they been able to make free movements, the effect on their affective state may have been stronger. This suggests that the pleasure induced by moving along to music associated with groove is only noticeable when listeners engage in unrestricted, whole-body movements (Bernardi et al., 2017(Bernardi et al., , 2018. However, it should be noted that there was no indication of this restrictive feeling in the participants' comments. ...
The effect of moving along to music on induced affect was investigated by asking two groups of participants ( N = 76) to listen to rhythmic patterns while either foot tapping along to the beat or staying still, respectively. Stimuli consisted of drum-breaks with three levels of syncopation (low, intermediate, high). Participants reported levels of induced pleasantness, relaxation, and wakefulness. It was hypothesized that participants who tapped along would experience greater pleasantness, less relaxation, and more wakefulness than those who remained still. In addition, it was predicted that stimuli with intermediate syncopation would be associated with greater pleasantness, following an inverted U-shaped function, and that increasing levels of syncopation would be associated with decreased relaxation and increased wakefulness. Results showed no differences in affective state between participants who tapped along and participants who stayed still. While the predicted associations between syncopation, pleasantness, and relaxation were only partially supported by the data, we did find an inverted U-shaped relationship between syncopation and difficulty to tap along, or stay still. The findings suggest that moving along to music does not automatically lead to more intense affective responses, potentially because any positive change associated with movement is outweighed by the difficulty of the synchronization task.
... A qualitative study focusing on artistically gifted adolescents in Singapore captured elements associated with flow, such as enjoying the activity, a strong sense of focus, and clear goals, as the adolescents shared their experiences of various art forms, including dancing, painting, music, and drama [10]. Another experiment involving Canadian university students found that dancing to music significantly increased the occurrence of flow [11]. Visiting museums or art galleries can create flow experiences [12], especially when using augmented reality guides [13]. ...
This study examined 430 Chinese college students’ engagement in arts activities and the psychological benefits derived from such activities. The research differentiated between various types of arts participation and ways of involvement and examined four potential positive psychological outcomes. The findings revealed correlations between (1) creative participation in the performing arts, ‘flow’, and aesthetic emotions; (2) consumptive participation in the visual arts and aesthetic emotions; and (3) creative participation in the literary arts and ego identity. Holistic arts participation demonstrated a significantly positive relationship with flourishing. A path analysis showed that flow experience and aesthetic emotions served as mediators in the mechanism through which holistic arts participation affected flourishing, with a chained mediation effect from flow experience to ego identity. This study confirms that arts participation is an effective pathway for individual flourishing and that more diverse and profound engagement in the arts can lead to sustained and widespread happiness.
... This study conceptualizes dance elements as second-order constructs composed of seven first-order constructs, including dance movements, music & sound, gestures & expressions, narrative & storytelling, technology & visual effects, sustainability symbolism, and cultural adaptation. These constructs, dimensions of dance elements, have been developed into 21 items contextualized within dance and sustainability, drawing from several previous studies [86,87]. Furthermore, this research integrates emotional engagement and environmental awareness into the AIDA model, developing six items modified and contextualized within dance and sustainability communication from prior research [88,89]. ...
In the face of pressing global challenges, coupling the synergy of dance arts, sustainability, and marketing communications emerges as a potent catalyst for advancing sustainable behavior within society. Although prior research has examined the emotional stimulations raised by dance performance, it has not systematically demonstrated the role of traditional dance as a vehicle for sustainability marketing communications. This study fills this gap by using the AIDA model (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action) as a foundation, conceptualizing dance performance elements into seven dimensions, and incorporating emotional engagement and environmental consciousness to foster sustainable behavior. Collaborating with Taiwanese dance troupe, the research produced a performance titled, ‘The New Dragon Palace Chronicle’, which focuses on the themes of destruction and preservation of underwater life, enriched with cultural and sustainability symbolism. The hypothesis were tested on a sample of 315 Taiwanese audience who watching the performance. The results confirmed that the seven dimensions of the dance elements have substantial validity and reliability, significantly drawing the attention of the audience as preliminary stage of awareness. This attention fosters emotional engagement and amplified environmental consciousness and significantly influences interest, desire, and ultimately, sustainable behavior action. The findings underscore the vital role of dance art performance in nurturing actions that contribute to social sustainability.
... Spontaneous dance to groovy music especially facilitates flow while listening. When dancing to upbeat music, people may sense increased flow because their movements seem effortless, automatic, and almost unconsciously produced (Bernardi et al., 2018). ...
Flow is a specific state of consciousness when people are completely immersed and concentrated on a task, that they lose the sense of time, and feel as if doing things unconsciously. This article aims to provide a brief overview of the flow in music, focused on music performance, and shed light on aspects such as psychological correlates, occurrence and educational applications. Our objective is to build a bridge between theory and practice examining the implications of flow for improving the musical practice. Several studies analyse flow in various musical activities, including improvisation/composition, listening and performance. Music improvisation is considered one of the most crucial pedagogical tools for promoting flow from the early years of music education on. Flow in music performance is the most extensively studied, and practical implications to facilitate optimal experience and flow conditions could be developed. In the final part of the article, educational strategies for inducing flow are proposed based on the nine characteristics of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990).
... At the same time, the features of short video applications should be updated constantly and in line with customer feedback so that browsing and content creation can become easier. As suggested in the literature, editing, and looping functionalities evoke emotions of vitality and positive feelings in users (Bernardi et al., 2018). ...
Background
Short videos are becoming increasingly popular globally, and users are devoting more time to viewing them. However, few studies have examined the characteristics of short video content and the technical features that are related to media use. The present study developed a model to explore the influence of technological affordances on short video usage and considered innovation in terms of format, setting, and content.
Method
A total of 496 viewers of short videos from China were surveyed. The participants completed 31 Likert-scale items. The study used maximum likelihood estimation modeling.
Results
The results revealed that perceived novelty and content value (entertainment and irritation) affected immersion positively, consequently influencing intentions for reuse and recommendation. The ease of navigating an application, narrative structure, and information value had no significant effect on immersion.
Conclusion
These findings have confirmed that perceived situation affordance and the affective affordance of short videos in digital environments that are managed by intelligent algorithms. It is necessary to analyze the potential impact of different affordances specifically.
... Flow is a state of complete absorption or engagement in an autotelic activity, an activity that one finds rewarding intrinsically irrespective of any end-product or extrinsic benefit. As such, it has been a paragon for research on well-being and positive psychology of human flourishing, thriving, and optimal experience (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990 include rock climbers (MacAloon & Csikszentmihalyi, 1983;Schattke et al., 2014), dancers (Bernardi, Bellemare-Pepin & Peretz, 2018) and other athletes (Swann et al., 2012), chess players (Tozman, Zhang & Vollmeyer, 2017), musicians (Chirico et al., 2015) and surgeons (Mulligan, 2016) who describe their state of complete absorption and full involvement as being "in flow" or, in more colloquial terms, as being "in the zone". While much of the scholarly work on flow comes from western-educated, industrialised, rich, democratic (WEIRD) contexts, continued investigation outside these contexts is revealing that the core features of the experience are widespread, present across cultural contexts and perhaps throughout history as well. ...
The concept of flow, a state of complete absorption in an intrinsically rewarding activity, has played a pivotal role in advancing notions of human well‐being beyond minimising suffering towards promoting flourishing and thriving. While flow has played a fundamental role in human positive psychology, it has not yet been explored in non‐human animals, leaving an enormous void in our understanding of intrinsic motivation in animals. As ethology and related fields keep progressing in uncovering complex cognitive and affective capacities of non‐human animals, we propose the time is ripe to translate the concept of flow to animals. We start by embedding flow in the topic of intrinsic motivation and describe its impact on positive human psychology and potentially positive animal welfare. We then disambiguate flow from related concepts discussed in the animal literature. Next, we derive experimental approaches in animals from the canonical characteristics of flow in humans and provide guidelines for both inducing and assessing flow by focusing on two characteristics that do not necessarily depend on self‐report, namely resistance to distraction and time distortion. Not all aspects of the human flow experience are (yet) translatable, but those that are may improve quality of life in captive non‐human animals.
... Csikszentmihalyi (1997) interviewed people of various ages, genders, and occupations and found that they experience flow in chess, climbing, or dancing, as they reported having to concentrate and focus on their respective activities. Some studies also demonstrate that dancing is inherently rewarding for dancers (Thomson & Jaque, 2012), and that dancers experience flow when they dance (Bernardi et al., 2018). According to these flow-related findings, middle-aged adults who participate in square dancing may experience transcendence and increase personal meaning. ...
Identifying predictors of meaning in life (MIL) among middle-aged adults is important to promote their well-being. To inform efforts to foster well-being for middle-aged adults, the purpose of this study was to examine whether transcendent experiences mediate the relationships between two types of leisure social support (leisure instrumental support and leisure emotional support) and MIL in this population. In total, 236 middle-aged adults participated in the study. We used in-person surveys to collect data on leisure instrumental support, leisure emotional support, transcendent experiences, and MIL as well as analyzed data conducting structural equation modeling. Results indicated that high levels of leisure instrumental support predicted high levels of transcendent experiences; high levels of transcendent experiences predicted high levels of MIL; and high levels of leisure instrumental support and leisure emotional support predicted high levels of MIL. We discuss implications of these results in terms of facilitating MIL experienced by middle-aged adults.
... Participants were given 2 minutes to create the song with a clear goal of making the song "sound as good as possible." Past literature suggests there is a strong association between music engagement and experiencing notable markers of flow experiences (e.g., effortless action execution, sense of control, challenging motor interactions; Bernardi et al., 2018; see review by Chirico et al., 2015). In the amusement condition, participants watched one 2-minute video of nature clips from the BBC's comedy series, Walk on the Wild Side, composed of talking animals (Piff et al., 2015;Valdesolo & Graham, 2014). ...
Having good moral character often involves shifting one’s focus of attention from the self to others and the world. Across three studies (N = 605 adults), we found converging evidence that self-transcendent experiences, specifically awe and flow, enabled the expression of wisdom, as captured by wise reasoning and epistemic humility measures. Study 1 found that dispositionally awe- and flow-prone people have stronger wise reasoning and epistemic humility abilities, over and above dispositional happiness. Consistent with Study 1, Study 2 found that, across diverse recalled experiences, individuals who experienced more awe showed greater wise reasoning, and those who experienced more flow showed greater epistemic humility. In Study 3, using situated interventions, we induced awe (watching a video involving vast nature scenes) and flow (composing a song using an online music maker) and compared them with neutral and amusement experiences. Compared to these control conditions, eliciting awe and flow facilitated one’s (1) ability to address interpersonal conflicts with wise reasoning, (2) ability to acknowledge one’s epistemic gaps, and (3) willingness to improve those aspects and one’s general moral character. Altogether, these findings reveal the promising role of self-transcendent experiences in motivating people to appreciate others’ perspectives beyond one’s own.
... is paper proposes to apply the motion capture technology to the tumbling posture recognition model of classical dance, establish a database to obtain the three-dimensional data of human motion in real time, and match the human posture based on the feature plane to obtain the Google model of human characteristics. Applying the above data to the posture teaching and analysis in the process of dance teaching is helpful to improve the teaching level of teachers, Mobilizing students' learning enthusiasm has good reference and application value [13,14]. Human motion posture analysis first rose abroad. ...
Chinese classical dance is cut into the inner verve from a grasp of external form in dance instruction, and the aesthetic fashion and artistic norms of classical dance are established with historical depth. The “professional specificity” of characters and the “language description” of plots are eliminated in Chinese classical dance creation, highlighting the contemporary spirit of classical dance creation. Chinese classical dance was born during the early years of the People’s Republic of China. The term “classical dance” did not refer to all Chinese classical dances at the time; rather, it referred to a dance form that embodied China’s national spirit and had a classical cultural heritage based on Chinese traditional dance. The average frequency of step-over was 0.9, which was higher than the average rate of basic turnover of 0.75 and step-by-step turnover of 0.5, according to the results of the SPSS19.0 analysis. As a result, except for a few points with loud noise, it can be concluded that stepping over is an effective feature. The recognition model of the somersault posture of classical dance is studied in this paper, a database for real-time acquisition of three-dimensional data of human motion is established, and the Google model of human body characteristics is obtained based on feature plane matching of human body posture, all using motion capture technology and few-shot learning. The above data has good reference and application value for improving teachers’ teaching level and arousing students’ learning enthusiasm in the dance teaching process when applied to posture teaching and analysis. The captured data can convert human motion in real three-dimensional space into data in virtual three-dimensional space. Motion capture technology converts human motion information into a technology that can be recognized by computers.
... In order to highlight and embody the thoughts and emotions of dance works, it is necessary to analyze and express the musical elements. Music is an art form of expressing rich emotions with sound, rhythm, and melody, while dance is an art form of expressing the emotional connotation of music with human body and movement [2][3][4]. Therefore, music and dance are closely related. For example, many ethnic dances in China have their own unique styles, and dance music also contains different cultural customs. ...
Music and dance are closely related and symbiotic. On the one hand, dance often requires music accompaniment. On the other hand, dance can enrich the melody and style of music. The emergence of the metaverse has taken the experience of music and dance to a new level. This paper studies the three-dimensional situational experience of music and dance in Virtual Reality (VR) empowered by metaverse to feel the beauty of situational integration. After the spherical video is projected onto a two-dimensional plane to form a panoramic video, the two-dimensional panoramic video needs to be converted into a spherical video for users to watch. Therefore, it is more reasonable to take spherical video distortion as the distortion measure of panoramic video coding. In this paper, spherical video distortion is taken as the measurement standard of video quality, and the panoramic video coding technology is optimized. Furthermore, the corresponding weights are introduced to change the distortion ratio of different interpolation regions in the calculation process of rate distortion cost, and a rate distortion optimization technology based on spherical distortion measurement is proposed. The equal weight feature of spherical pixel is realized on two-dimensional plane, which improves the coding efficiency of panoramic video. Experimental results show that compared with the three benchmarks, the proposed algorithm can achieve 1.6157% bit saving on average and achieve a good Quality of Experience (QoE) when other processes are the same.
... As such, it has been a paragon for research on wellbeing and positive psychology of human flourishing, thriving, and optimal experience (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). Research subjects on autotelic experience include rock climbers (MacAloon and Csikszentmihalyi, 1983;Schattke et al., 2014), dancers (Bernardi et al., 2018) and other athletes (Swann et al., 2012), chess players (Tozman et al., 2017), musicians (Chirico et al., 2015) and surgeons (Mulligan, 2016) who describe their state of complete absorption and full involvement as being "in flow" or, in more colloquial terms, as being "in the zone". ...
The concept of flow, a state of complete absorption in an intrinsically rewarding activity, has played a pivotal role in advancing notions of human well-being beyond minimising suffering towards promoting flourishing and thriving. While flow has played a fundamental role in human positive psychology, it has not yet been explored in non-human animals, leaving an enormous void in our understanding of intrinsic motivation in animals. As ethology and related fields keep progressing in uncovering complex cognitive and affective capacities of non-human animals, we propose the time is ripe to translate the concept of flow to animals. We start by embedding flow in the topic of intrinsic motivation and describe its impact on positive human psychology and potentially positive animal welfare. We then disambiguate flow from related concepts discussed in the animal literature. Next, we derive experimental approaches in animals from the canonical characteristics of flow in humans and provide guidelines for both inducing and assessing flow by focusing on two characteristics that do not necessarily depend on self-report, namely resistance to distraction and time distortion. Not all aspects of the human flow experience are (yet) translatable, but those that are may improve quality of life in non-human animals.
... First, regarding the musical expectancy mechanism, whereas several studies associate violations of musical expectancies with physiological and experienced arousal (Egermann et al., 2013;Koelsch et al., 2008;Steinbeis et al., 2006), other research associate these violations with experienced pleasantness and liking (Cheung et al., 2019;Shany et al., 2019). Second, regarding the evidence for the effects of rhythmic entrainment on valence, the evidence is contradictory: some studies have found significant effects (Bernardi et al., 2017(Bernardi et al., , 2018Labbé & Grandjean, 2014;Witek et al., 2014) while others have found no association (Janata et al., 2012, Cespedes-Guevara & Witek, in press). And third, regarding the effects of music on experienced tension, perhaps the most informative evidence has been provided by Illie and Thompson (2006) who compared the effects of musical loudness, tempo, and pitch height (and their equivalents in vocalizations) on the participants' valence, and tense and energetic arousal (Schimmack & Grob, 2000). ...
Listening to music can arouse a variety of affective responses. The study of this phenomenon has flourished during the last two decades, particularly thanks to the contribution of the BRECVEMA theory and the Multifactorial Process Model. Nevertheless, these theoretical frameworks have neglected the symbolic dimension of music, and the effect of situational factors. The first aim of this article is to overcome these shortcomings by proposing a model based on contemporary constructionist theories of emotion. This novel approach proposes that listening to music activates automatic perceptual mechanisms that produce fluctuations of affect, and that the activation of associative and appraisal mechanisms transform the fluctuations of affect into a variety of emotional and nonemotional responses. The main proposal is that adopting this constructionist model constitutes a fruitful approach, as it provides a holistic heuristic framework that produces new hypotheses for future investigation of affective experiences with music.
... When people participate in music-associated activities, their emotional experience is a key aspect that includes psychology and cognitive neuroscience [1,2]. Psychology considers that anxiety, sadness, and tension are negative emotions. ...
The nonlinear dynamic characteristics of human brain cognition and music stimulation are introduced based on the negative emotions of college students to explore the influence of music stimulation on human brain cognition activities and analyze the nonlinear dynamic characteristics of electroencephalogram (EEG) signals. First, the correlation between EEG signals and human brain cognition, as well as the nonlinear dynamics of cognition, are explained. The average correlation dimension and the maximum value of the Lyapunov exponent are selected to characterize the nonlinear dynamic characteristics of EEG signals. Second, the power spectrum and EEG coherence are considered, and an emotion assessment algorithm is proposed. Finally, music stimulation is introduced, and its role in adjusting college students’ negative emotions is discussed. Results demonstrate significant differences in the average correlation dimension and the maximum value of the Lyapunov component of the participants in different cognition states under normal physiological conditions. The cognition function state shows chaotic behaviors, explaining the nonlinear dynamic characteristics of EEG signals. After music stimulation, a significant increase in EEG relative power is mostly located in the frontal and temporal regions of the brain. The EEG coherence in the same brain region shows growth changes. After the intervention of music stimulation, the emotion assessment scores of the self-rating anxiety scale, the positive and negative affect schedule, and the self-rating depression scale are reduced, and the entire changing process presents statistical significance. In conclusion, music stimulation intervention can affect human brain cognition activity, playing a positive role in emotion regulation.
... Ruth, Spangardt, and Schramm (2016) provided empirical evidence for the influence of a concentrated form of music-listening (analytical music-listening) on flow, that is, lower levels of analytical listening reduce flow when listening to complex music. Bernardi, Bellemare-Pepin, and Peretz (2018) investigated the occurrence of flow while either listening and dancing to music or listening to music without moving. The results here showed that music listening does evoke flow, depending on the music listened to. ...
Flow describes a state of total absorption in an activity. This optimal experience has received much attention in research on music-playing and performing, but not on interindividual differences in music-listening. We expect differences in the intensity of flow between performing music and listening to music and in the relationships with subjective well-being. In Study 1 (N = 207; questionnaire study), we investigated differences in flow between performing and listening to music in three dimensions of flow. We analyzed correlations between flow, previous musical training, music experience, and subjective well-being. Participants reported a more intense flow experience while listening to music than while performing music. Flow was significantly associated with subjective well-being and music experience. For performing music, flow was positively correlated with previous musical practice. Study 2 (N = 383; questionnaire study) focused on flow while listening to music and subjective well-being, and on the role a flexible self-concept plays in this phenomenon. Stronger relationships between flow and subjective well-being were obtained for individuals with a highly flexible self-concept. Flow was positively correlated with music experience. The results provided evidence for relationships between flow, previous musical practice, and music experience. Correlations with subjective well-being depend on processes of self-regulation.
... An augmentation of the impact could be established when implementing dance therapy in the treatments for autism (Koch et al., 2015), depression (Jeong et al., 2005;Haboush et al., 2006;Koch et al., 2007) and Parkinson Disease Earhart, 2009, 2010;Duncan and Earhart, 2012;Houston and McGill, 2013). In its multi-faceted ways, dance is assumed to promote human creativity (Fink and Woschnjak, 2011), social competence (Lobo and Winsler, 2006), enjoyment (Gao et al., 2013a,b), contributes to well-being (Mansfield et al., 2018) and can lead to the experience of flow (Bernardi et al., 2018). ...
Besides the pure pleasure of watching a dance performance, dance as a whole-body movement is becoming increasingly popular for health-related interventions. However, the science-based evidence for improvements in health or well-being through dance is still ambiguous and little is known about the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms. This may be partly related to the fact that previous studies mostly examined the neurophysiological effects of imagination and observation of dance rather than the physical execution itself. The objective of this pilot study was to investigate acute effects of a physically executed dance with its different components (recalling the choreography and physical activity to music) on the electrical brain activity and its functional connectivity using electroencephalographic (EEG) analysis. Eleven dance-inexperienced female participants first learned a Modern Jazz Dance (MJD) choreography over three weeks (1 h sessions per week). Afterwards, the acute effects on the EEG brain activity were compared between four different test conditions: physically executing the MJD choreography with music, physically executing the choreography without music, imaging the choreography with music, and imaging the choreography without music. Every participant passed each test condition in a randomized order within a single day. EEG rest-measurements were conducted before and after each test condition. Considering time effects the physically executed dance without music revealed in brain activity analysis most increases in alpha frequency and in functional connectivity analysis in all frequency bands. In comparison, physically executed dance with music as well as imagined dance with music led to fewer increases and imagined dance without music provoked noteworthy brain activity and connectivity decreases at all frequency bands. Differences between the test conditions were found in alpha and beta frequency between the physically executed dance and the imagined dance without music as well as between the physically executed dance with and without music in the alpha frequency. The study highlights different effects of a physically executed dance compared to an imagined dance on many brain areas for all measured frequency bands. These findings provide first insights into the still widely unexplored field of neurological effects of dance and encourages further research in this direction.
Theories of human emotion, including some emotion embodiment theories, suggest that our moods and affective states are reflected in the movements of our bodies. We used the reverse process for mood regulation; modulate body movements to regulate mood. Dancing is a type of full-body movement characterized by affective expressivity and, hence, offers the possibility to express different affective states through the same movement sequences. We tested whether the repeated imitation of a dancer performing two simple full-body dance movement sequences with different affective expressivity (happy or sad) could change mood states. Computer-based systems, using avatars as dance models to imitate, offer a series of advantages such as independence from physical contact and location. Therefore, we compared mood induction effects in two conditions: participants were asked to imitate dance movements from one of the two avatars showing: (a) videos of a human dancer model or (b) videos of a robot dancer model. The mood induction was successful for both happy and sad imitations, regardless of condition (human vs. robot avatar dance model). Moreover, the magnitude of happy mood induction and how much participants liked the task predicted work-related motivation after the mood induction. We conclude that mood regulation through dance movements is possible and beneficial in the work context.
Tüketicilerin satın alma karar süreci demografik, sosyal, kültürel, kişisel, psikolojik faktörlerin ya da pazarlama araçları tarafından şekillenen faktörlerin etkisi altında ortaya çıkmaktadır. Bu anlamda dışsal ve içsel faktörler olarak ele alınabilecek olan bu türden faktörler, tüketicilerin zihninde gerçekleşen değerlendirmeyi etkileyerek bazı yanıtlar (tepkiler) meydana getirmektedir. Bu araştırma, sanal mağaza atmosferi, satış promosyonları, akış deneyimi ve impulsif satın alma değişkenleri arasındaki ilişkileri S-O-R paradigması kapsamında incelemeyi amaçlamıştır. Bu doğrultuda sanal mağaza atmosferi ve satış promosyonları dışsal uyaranlar, akış deneyimi organizma (zihinsel süreç) ve impulsif satın alma bir tüketici tepkisi olarak ele alınmış ve bir nicel araştırma kapsamında araştırmanın teorik modeli değerlendirilmiştir. Araştırmanın verilerini online anket yoluyla erişilen 407 tüketicinin yanıtları oluşturmuş ve veriler SPSS 24 ve AMOS 24 istatistik yazılımlarında çözümlenmiştir. Yapılan analizler sonucunda iyi uyum iyiliği gösteren bir yapısal eşitlik modeli kapsamında elde edilen bulgular, sanal mağaza atmosferi, satış promosyonları, akış deneyimi ve impulsif satın alma davranışı arasında istatistiksel olarak anlamlı ilişkiler bulunduğunu ortaya koymuştur. Sonuçlara göre akış deneyimi, hem sanal mağaza atmosferi ile impulsif satın alma arasında hem de satış promosyonları ile impulsif satın alma arasında aracılık rolü üstlenmektedir. Ayrıca sosyo-demografik özellikler ile alışveriş alışkanlıklarına ilişkin bazı faktörlerin istatistiksel olarak anlamlı gruplararası farklılıklar sergilediği ortaya çıkmıştır.
Since tourism is an experience-intensive field, the experiences offered by tourism activities to individuals are very important. Understanding the psychological processes underlying the experiences of the individuals is essential for the effectiveness of tourism activities. An important phenomenon that explains the internal processes experienced by individuals in tourism activities is the flow experience originating from positive psychology. Flow experience is the individual's intense focus on the activity he/she is performing with his/her own inner will, without any external reward, and integrates with the activity by being isolated from the environment. Also, the flow experience can be expressed as an internal process that includes losing the perception of time and feeling happiness. Today, some research shows that the flow experience can be experienced in many areas of daily life and tourism activities. In this chapter, the flow experience has been discussed with its various dimensions, and evaluations have been made in the context of examples of some tourism activities.
The present text provides brief documentation of the 122 papers published in the three proceedings of The Neurosciences and Music Conferences 2011, 2014 and 2017.
The intention of this internet publication is to facilitate quick access to information about music-related neuroscience for interested students, educators and researchers.
Part one indicates the themes and objectives of the three conferences, prominent areas of investigation, and cultural references. Summaries highlight selections of papers from each conference.
Part two provides three schematic surveys of the papers in the conference proceedings.
The surveys report, for each paper: the aim of the study, its musical material, cultural references and categories of investigation, the applied technology and procedure, and the main focus and conclusion of the study.
The present study investigates how people move and relate to each other – and to the dance music – in a club-like setting created within a motion capture laboratory. Three groups of participants (29 in total) each danced to a 10-minute-long DJ mix consisting of four tracks of electronic dance music (EDM). Two of the EDM tracks had little structural development, while the two others included a typical “break routine” in the middle of the track, consisting of three distinct passages: (a) “breakdown”, (b) “build-up” and (c) “drop”. The motion capture data show similar bodily responses for all three groups in the break routines: a sudden decrease and increase in the general quantity of motion. More specifically, the participants demonstrated an improved level of interpersonal synchronization after the drop, particularly in their vertical movements. Furthermore, the participants’ activity increased and became more pronounced after the drop. This may suggest that the temporal removal and reintroduction of a clear rhythmic framework, as well as the use of intensifying sound features, have a profound effect on a group’s beat synchronization. Our results further suggest that the musical passages of EDM efficiently lead to the entrainment of a whole group, and that a break routine effectively “re-energizes” the dancing.
Dancing emphasizes the motor expression of emotional experiences. The bodily expression of emotions can modulate the subjective experience of emotions, as when adopting emotion-specific postures and faces. Thus, dancing potentially offers a ground for emotional coping through emotional enhancement and regulation. Here we investigated the emotional responses to music in individuals without any prior dance training while they either freely danced or refrained from movement. Participants were also tested while imitating their own dance movements but in the absence of music as a control condition. Emotional ratings and cardio-respiratory measures were collected following each condition. Dance movements were recorded using motion capture. We found that emotional valence was increased specifically during spontaneous dance of groovy excerpts, compared to both still listening and motor imitation. Furthermore, parasympathetic-related heart rate variability (HRV) increased during dance compared to motor imitation. Nevertheless, subjective and physiological arousal increased during movement production, regardless of whether participants were dancing or imitating. Significant correlations were found between inter-individual differences in the emotions experienced during dance and whole-body acceleration profiles. The combination of movement and music during dance results in a distinct state characterized by acutely heightened pleasure, which is of potential interest for the use of dance in therapeutic settings.
Previous studies have found relationships between music-induced movement and musical characteristics on more general levels, such as tempo or pulse clarity. This study focused on synchronization abilities to music of finely-varying tempi and varying degrees of low-frequency spectral change/flux. Excerpts from six classic Motown/R&B songs at three different tempos (105, 115, and 130 BPM) were used as stimuli in this experiment. Each was then time-stretched by a factor of 5% with regard to the original tempo, yielding a total of 12 stimuli that were presented to 30 participants. Participants were asked to move along with the stimuli while being recorded with an optical motion capture system. Synchronization analysis was performed relative to the beat and the bar level of the music and four body parts. Results suggest that participants synchronized different body parts to specific metrical levels; in particular, vertical movements of hip and feet were synchronized to the beat level when the music contained large amounts of low-frequency spectral flux and had a slower tempo, while synchronization of head and hands was more tightly coupled to the weak flux stimuli at the bar level. Synchronization was generally more tightly coupled to the slower versions of the same stimuli, while synchronization showed an inverted u-shape effect at the bar level as tempo increased. These results indicate complex relationships between musical characteristics, in particular regarding metrical and temporal structure, and our ability to synchronize and entrain to such musical stimuli.
The vast majority of humans move in time with a musical beat. This behaviour has been mostly studied through finger-tapping synchronization. Here, we evaluate naturalistic synchronization responses to music-bouncing and clapping-in 100 university students. Their ability to match the period of their bounces and claps to those of a metronome and musical clips varying in beat saliency was assessed. In general, clapping was better synchronized with the beat than bouncing, suggesting that the choice of a specific movement type is an important factor to consider in the study of sensorimotor synchronization processes. Performance improved as a function of beat saliency, indicating that beat abstraction plays a significant role in synchronization. Fourteen percent of the population exhibited marked difficulties with matching the beat. Yet, at a group level, poor synchronizers showed similar sensitivity to movement type and beat saliency as normal synchronizers. These results suggest the presence of quantitative rather than qualitative variations when losing the beat.
I argue that core aspects of musical rhythm, especially “groove” and syncopation, can only be fully understood in the context of their origins in the participatory social experience of dance. Musical meter is first considered in the context of bodily movement. I then offer an interpretation of the pervasive but somewhat puzzling phenomenon of syncopation in terms of acoustic emphasis on certain offbeat components of the accompanying dance style. The reasons for the historical tendency of many musical styles to divorce themselves from their dance-based roots are also briefly considered. To the extent that musical rhythms only make sense in the context of bodily movement, researchers interested in ecologically valid approaches to music cognition should make a more concerted effort to extend their analyses to dance, particularly if we hope to understand the cognitive constraints underlying rhythmic aspects of music like meter and groove.
We report an experiment investigating whether dancing to the same music enhances recall of person-related memory targets. The experiment used 40 dancers (all of whom were unaware of the experiment’s aim), two-channel silent-disco radio headphones, a marked-up dance floor, two types of music, and memory targets (sash colors and symbols). In each trial, 10 dancers wore radio headphones and one of four different colored sashes, half of which carried cat symbols. Using silent-disco technology, one type of music was surreptitiously transmitted to half the dancers, while music at a different tempo was transmitted to the remaining dancers. Pre-experiment, the dancers’ faces were photographed. Post-experiment, each dancer was presented with the photographs of the other dancers and asked to recall their memory targets. Results showed that same-music dancing significantly enhanced memory for sash color and sash symbol. Our findings are discussed in light of recent eye-movement research that showed significantly increased gaze durations for people observing music-dance synchrony versus music-dance asynchrony, and in relation to current literature on interpersonal entrainment, group cohesion, and social bonding.
The purpose of this study was to examine possible psychological correlates of flow in a sample of older athletes. Both state and trait, or dispositional flow states, were examined. Masters athletes completed questionnaire assessments on two occasions while competing at an international masters sport competition. The participants (398) completed a questionnaire assessing intrinsic/extrinsic motivation, goal orientation, trait anxiety, perceived ability, and typical flow experiences (trait) when participating in sport. Of these participants, 213 completed a questionnaire after and in relation to one event they competed in at the Games. This second questionnaire assessed state flow, as well as perceptions of success, skills, and challenges in a selected sport event. Correlational and multivariate analyses were conducted to examine psychological correlates of state and trait flow. Patterns of relationships were found between flow and perceived ability, anxiety, and an intrinsic motivation variable. Understanding flow and its relationship with other psychological variables are discussed.
Rhythmic entrainment, or beat synchronization, provides an opportunity to understand how multiple systems operate together to integrate sensory-motor information. Also, synchronization is an essential component of musical performance that may be enhanced through musical training. Investigations of rhythmic entrainment have revealed a developmental trajectory across the lifespan, showing synchronization improves with age and musical experience. Here, we explore the development and maintenance of synchronization in childhood through older adulthood in a large cohort of participants (N = 145), and also ask how it may be altered by musical experience. We employed a uniform assessment of beat synchronization for all participants and compared performance developmentally and between individuals with and without musical experience. We show that the ability to consistently tap along to a beat improves with age into adulthood, yet in older adulthood tapping performance becomes more variable. Also, from childhood into young adulthood, individuals are able to tap increasingly close to the beat (i.e., asynchronies decline with age), however, this trend reverses from younger into older adulthood. There is a positive association between proportion of life spent playing music and tapping performance, which suggests a link between musical experience and auditory-motor integration. These results are broadly consistent with previous investigations into the development of beat synchronization across the lifespan, and thus complement existing studies and present new insights offered by a different, large cross-sectional sample.
Music has the capacity to induce movement in humans. Such responses during music listening are usually spontaneous and range from tapping to full-body dancing. However, it is still unclear how humans embody musical structures to facilitate entrainment. This paper describes two experiments, one dealing with period locking to different metrical levels in full-body movement and its relationships to beat- and rhythm-related musical characteristics, and the other dealing with phase locking in the more constrained condition of sideways swaying motions. Expected in Experiment 1 was that music with clear and strong beat structures would facilitate more period-locked movement. Experiment 2 was assumed to yield a common phase relationship between participants' swaying movements and the musical beat. In both experiments optical motion capture was used to record participants' movements. In Experiment 1 a window-based period-locking probability index related to four metrical levels was established, based on acceleration data in three dimensions. Subsequent correlations between this index and musical characteristics of the stimuli revealed pulse clarity to be related to periodic movement at the tactus level, and low frequency flux to mediolateral and anteroposterior movement at both tactus and bar levels. At faster tempi higher metrical levels became more apparent in participants' movement. Experiment 2 showed that about half of the participants showed a stable phase relationship between movement and beat, with superior-inferior movement most often being synchronized to the tactus level, whereas mediolateral movement was rather synchronized to the bar level. However, the relationship between movement phase and beat locations was not consistent between participants, as the beat locations occurred at different phase angles of their movements. The results imply that entrainment to music is a complex phenomenon, involving the whole body and occurring at different metrical levels.
In order to better understand the musical properties which elicit an increased sensation of wanting to move when listening to music—groove—we investigate the effect of adding syncopation to simple piano melodies, under the hypothesis that syncopation is correlated to groove. Across two experiments we examine listeners' experience of groove to synthesized musical stimuli covering a range of syncopation levels and densities of musical events, according to formal rules implemented by a computer algorithm that shifts musical events from strong to weak metrical positions. Results indicate that moderate levels of syncopation lead to significantly higher groove ratings than melodies without any syncopation or with maximum possible syncopation. A comparison between the various transformations and the way they were rated shows that there is no simple relation between syncopation magnitude and groove.
We tested whether pre-assigned arm movements performed in a group setting spontaneously synchronized and whether synchronization extended to heart and respiratory rhythms. We monitored arm movements, respiration and electrocardiogram at rest and during spontaneous, music and metronome-associated arm-swinging. No directions were given on whether or how the arm swinging were to be synchronized between participants or with the external cues. Synchronization within 3 groups of 10 participants studied collectively was compared with pseudo-synchronization of 3 groups of 10 participants that underwent an identical protocol but in an individual setting. Motor synchronization was found to be higher in the collective groups than in the individuals for the metronome-associated condition. On a repetition of the protocol on the following day, motor synchronization in the collective groups extended to the spontaneous, un-cued condition. Breathing was also more synchronized in the collective groups than in the individuals, particularly at rest and in the music-associated condition. Group synchronization occurs without explicit instructions, and involves both movements and respiratory control rhythms.
Moving to music is an essential human pleasure particularly related to musical groove. Structurally, music associated with groove is often characterised by rhythmic complexity in the form of syncopation, frequently observed in musical styles such as funk, hip-hop and electronic dance music. Structural complexity has been related to positive affect in music more broadly, but the function of syncopation in eliciting pleasure and body-movement in groove is unknown. Here we report results from a web-based survey which investigated the relationship between syncopation and ratings of wanting to move and experienced pleasure. Participants heard funk drum-breaks with varying degrees of syncopation and audio entropy, and rated the extent to which the drum-breaks made them want to move and how much pleasure they experienced. While entropy was found to be a poor predictor of wanting to move and pleasure, the results showed that medium degrees of syncopation elicited the most desire to move and the most pleasure, particularly for participants who enjoy dancing to music. Hence, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between syncopation, body-movement and pleasure, and syncopation seems to be an important structural factor in embodied and affective responses to groove.
Listening to music makes us move in various ways. Several factors can affect the characteristics of these movements, including individual factors and musical features. Additionally, music-induced movement may also be shaped by the emotional content of the music, since emotions are an important element of musical expression. This study investigates possible relationships between emotional characteristics of music and music-induced, quasi-spontaneous movement. We recorded music-induced movement of 60 individuals, and computationally extracted features from the movement data. Additionally, the emotional content of the stimuli was assessed in a perceptual experiment. A subsequent correlational analysis revealed characteristic movement features for each emotion, suggesting that the body reflects emotional qualities of music. The results show similarities to movements of professional musicians and dancers, and to emotion-specific nonverbal behavior in general, and could furthermore be linked to notions of embodied music cognition. The valence and arousal ratings were subsequently projected onto polar coordinates to further investigate connections between the emotions of Russell’s (1980) circumplex models and the movement features
Music is a powerful medium capable of eliciting a broad range of emotions. Although the relationship between language and music is well documented, relatively little is known about the effects of lyrics and the voice on the emotional processing of music and on listeners' preferences. In the present study, we investigated the effects of vocals in music on participants' perceived valence and arousal in songs. Participants (N = 50) made valence and arousal ratings for familiar songs that were presented with and without the voice. We observed robust effects of vocal content on perceived arousal. Furthermore, we found that the effect of the voice on enhancing arousal ratings is independent of familiarity of the song and differs across genders and age: females were more influenced by vocals than males; furthermore these gender effects were enhanced among older adults. Results highlight the effects of gender and aging in emotion perception and are discussed in terms of the social roles of music.
Previous research has shown that the matching of rhythmic behaviour between individuals (synchrony) increases cooperation. Such synchrony is most noticeable in music, dance and collective rituals. As well as the matching of behaviour, such collective performances typically involve shared intentionality: performers actively collaborate to produce joint actions. Over three experiments we examined the importance of shared intentionality in promoting cooperation from group synchrony. Experiment 1 compared a condition in which group synchrony was produced through shared intentionality to conditions in which synchrony or asynchrony were created as a by-product of hearing the same or different rhythmic beats. We found that synchrony combined with shared intentionality produced the greatest level of cooperation. To examinef the importance of synchrony when shared intentionality is present, Experiment 2 compared a condition in which participants deliberately worked together to produce synchrony with a condition in which participants deliberately worked together to produce asynchrony. We found that synchrony combined with shared intentionality produced the greatest level of cooperation. Experiment 3 manipulated both the presence of synchrony and shared intentionality and found significantly greater cooperation with synchrony and shared intentionality combined. Path analysis supported a reinforcement of cooperation model according to which perceiving synchrony when there is a shared goal to produce synchrony provides immediate feedback for successful cooperation so reinforcing the group's cooperative tendencies. The reinforcement of cooperation model helps to explain the evolutionary conservation of traditional music and dance performances, and furthermore suggests that the collectivist values of such cultures may be an essential part of the mechanisms by which synchrony galvanises cooperative behaviours.
The idea that beat induction derives from body movement is attractive, but
until recently unequivocal empirical evidence of such a linkage has been elusive. Todd et
al. (2007) provide evidence that individual differences in locomotion affect preferred beat
rate, and Phillips-Silver & Trainor (2005, 2007, under review) show that metrical
interpretation is affected by movement. These studies examine different aspects of
rhythm processing, but together provide converging evidence for pervasive
movement/auditory interactions.
In the scaling of emotions in general, and their application to music in particular, the valence (good/bad) and activity or arousal dimensions are ubiquitous. Naive intuition and critics' writings have assumed a greater profundity in music's ability to express emotions than this would imply. Five experiments were performed to show that music is capable of expressing a greater detail in emotional range than can be captured by these two dimensions. The basic paradigm had participants rank order sets of emotions with respect to how well they applied to brief, unfamiliar instrumental selections. People did so rapidly, with significant reliability, even when the affective compass of the emotions to be ranked was restricted to enforce attention to subtle withindimension distinctions, or expanded to allow attention to subtle distinctions. Copyright
The aim of this study was to examine the effect of two basic emotions, happiness and sadness, on dance movement. A total of 32 adult participants were induced to feel emotional states of either happiness or sadness and then danced intuitively to an emotionally ‘neutral’ piece of music, composed specifically for the experiment. Based on an Effort-Shape analysis of body movement, full body movement was captured and seven different movement cues were examined, in order to explore whether differences in corporeal articulations between the happy and sad condition existed. Results revealed that in the happy condition, participants moved faster, with more acceleration, and made more expanded and more impulsive movements than in the sad condition. Results are discussed with respect to possible consequences for future research on human movement.
Associations between exercise and mental well-being have been documented repeatedly over the last two decades. More recently, there has been application of exercise interventions to clinical populations diagnosed with depression, anxiety, and eating disorders with evidence of substantial benefit. Nonetheless, attention to the efficacy of exercise interventions in clinical settings has been notably absent in the psychosocial treatment literature, as have been calls for the integration of these methods within the clinical practice of psychologists. In this article, we provide a quantitative and qualitative review of these efficacy studies in clinical samples and discuss the potential mechanism of action of exercise interventions, with attention to both biological and psychosocial processes. The meta-analysis of 11 treatment outcome studies of individuals with depression yielded a very large combined effect size for the advantage of exercise over control conditions: g = 1.39 (95% CI: .89–1.88), corresponding to a d = 1.42 (95% CI: .92–1.93). Based on these findings, we encourage clinicians to consider the role of adjunctive exercise interventions in their clinical practice and we discuss issues concerning this integration.
The importance of music in our daily life has given rise to an increased number of studies addressing the brain regions involved in its appreciation. Some of these studies controlled only for the familiarity of the stimuli, while others relied on pleasantness ratings, and others still on musical preferences. With a listening test and a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment, we wished to clarify the role of familiarity in the brain correlates of music appreciation by controlling, in the same study, for both familiarity and musical preferences. First, we conducted a listening test, in which participants rated the familiarity and liking of song excerpts from the pop/rock repertoire, allowing us to select a personalized set of stimuli per subject. Then, we used a passive listening paradigm in fMRI to study music appreciation in a naturalistic condition with increased ecological value. Brain activation data revealed that broad emotion-related limbic and paralimbic regions as well as the reward circuitry were significantly more active for familiar relative to unfamiliar music. Smaller regions in the cingulate cortex and frontal lobe, including the motor cortex and Broca's area, were found to be more active in response to liked music when compared to disliked one. Hence, familiarity seems to be a crucial factor in making the listeners emotionally engaged with music, as revealed by fMRI data.
The urge to move in response to music, combined with the positive affect associated with the coupling of sensory and motor processes while engaging with music (referred to as sensorimotor coupling) in a seemingly effortless way, is commonly described as the feeling of being in the groove. Here, we systematically explore this compelling phenomenon in a population of young adults. We utilize multiple levels of analysis, comprising phenomenological, behavioral, and computational techniques. Specifically, we show (a) that the concept of the groove is widely appreciated and understood in terms of a pleasurable drive toward action, (b) that a broad range of musical excerpts can be appraised reliably for the degree of perceived groove, (c) that the degree of experienced groove is inversely related to experienced difficulty of bimanual sensorimotor coupling under tapping regimes with varying levels of expressive constraint, (d) that high-groove stimuli elicit spontaneous rhythmic movements, and (e) that quantifiable measures of the quality of sensorimotor coupling predict the degree of experienced groove. Our results complement traditional discourse regarding the groove, which has tended to take the psychological phenomenon for granted and has focused instead on the musical and especially the rhythmic qualities of particular genres of music that lead to the perception of groove. We conclude that groove can be treated as a psychological construct and model system that allows for experimental exploration of the relationship between sensorimotor coupling with music and emotion.
The overarching aim of the present study is to expand current approaches to assessing task absorption and subjective experience by assessing two brief measures of flow: (1) ‘short’ flow, reflecting an aggregate or global measure drawn from the ‘long’ multi-item multi-factor flow instrument and (2) ‘core’ flow reflecting the phenomenology of the subjective flow experience itself. We propose that short and core flow have complementary but non-overlapping merits, purposes, and applications. Study 1 examines ‘short’ flow in work (N = 637), sport (N = 239), and music (N = 224). Study 2 examines ‘core’ flow in general school (N = 2,229), extracurricular activity (N = 2,229), mathematics (N = 378), and sport (N = 220) contexts. With few exceptions, both flow measures demonstrated: (a) acceptable model fit, reliability, and distributions, (b) associations with motivation in hypothesized ways, and (c) invariance in factor loadings across diverse samples. Where common data are available, both short and core flow are positively correlated, but with approximately half the variance unexplained they are clearly not the same construct, and so we offer guidance regarding which measure/s to use under particular circumstances. We conclude that the brief flow measures are appropriate for research examining task absorption, subjective experience, and cognate constructs such as motivation.
Humans have a unique ability to coordinate their motor movements to an external auditory stimulus, as in music-induced foot tapping or dancing. This behavior currently engages the attention of scholars across a number of disciplines. However, very little is known about its earliest manifestations. The aim of the current research was to examine whether preverbal infants engage in rhythmic behavior to music. To this end, we carried out two experiments in which we tested 120 infants (aged 5-24 months). Infants were exposed to various excerpts of musical and rhythmic stimuli, including isochronous drumbeats. Control stimuli consisted of adult- and infant-directed speech. Infants' rhythmic movements were assessed by multiple methods involving manual coding from video excerpts and innovative 3D motion-capture technology. The results show that (i) infants engage in significantly more rhythmic movement to music and other rhythmically regular sounds than to speech; (ii) infants exhibit tempo flexibility to some extent (e.g., faster auditory tempo is associated with faster movement tempo); and (iii) the degree of rhythmic coordination with music is positively related to displays of positive affect. The findings are suggestive of a predisposition for rhythmic movement in response to music and other metrically regular sounds.
The main purpose of this study was to examine psychological factors of potential relevance to athletic flow experiences. A secondary purpose was to empirically examine the relationship between flow and optimal performance. Understanding factors that may be associated with flow will help to make this optimal mental state more accessible to researchers and practitioners. Self-concept and use of psychological skills were predicted to be related to self-reported flow states. Competitive athletes across three sports completed dispositional assessments of athletic self-concept, psychological skills, and flow. The athletes also completed a post-event flow assessment, as well as other questions relating to their performance, after a specified competitive event. Positive relationships were found between flow and aspects of self-concept, and the relationships between flow and psychological skills use were also in the expected directions. In addition, the predicted positive relationship between a post-event flow assessment and performance criteria was obtained. This study builds on earlier research that has investigated antecedents of flow, and contributes to the expanding knowledge base of psychological factors related to optimal experience and performance.
One reason for the universal appeal of music lies in the emotional rewards that music offers to its listeners. But what makes these rewards so special? The authors addressed this question by progressively characterizing music-induced emotions in 4 interrelated studies. Studies 1 and 2 (n=354) were conducted to compile a list of music-relevant emotion terms and to study the frequency of both felt and perceived emotions across 5 groups of listeners with distinct music preferences. Emotional responses varied greatly according to musical genre and type of response (felt vs. perceived). Study 3 (n=801)--a field study carried out during a music festival--examined the structure of music-induced emotions via confirmatory factor analysis of emotion ratings, resulting in a 9-factorial model of music-induced emotions. Study 4 (n=238) replicated this model and found that it accounted for music-elicited emotions better than the basic emotion and dimensional emotion models. A domain-specific device to measure musically induced emotions is introduced--the Geneva Emotional Music Scale.
The chameleon effect refers to nonconscious mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, facial expressions, and other behaviors of one's interaction partners, such that one's behavior passively and unintentionally changes to match that of others in one's current social environment. The authors suggest that the mechanism involved is the perception-behavior link, the recently documented finding (e.g., J. A. Bargh, M. Chen, & L. Burrows, 1996) that the mere perception of another's behavior automatically increases the likelihood of engaging in that behavior oneself. Experiment 1 showed that the motor behavior of participants unintentionally matched that of strangers with whom they worked on a task. Experiment 2 had confederates mimic the posture and movements of participants and showed that mimicry facilitates the smoothness of interactions and increases liking between interaction partners. Experiment 3 showed that dispositionally empathic individuals exhibit the chameleon effect to a greater extent than do other people.
The runner's high describes a euphoric state resulting from long-distance running. The cerebral neurochemical correlates of exercise-induced mood changes have been barely investigated so far. We aimed to unravel the opioidergic mechanisms of the runner's high in the human brain and to identify the relationship to perceived euphoria. We performed a positron emission tomography "ligand activation" study with the nonselective opioidergic ligand 6-O-(2-[(18)F]fluoroethyl)-6-O-desmethyldiprenorphine ([(18)F]FDPN). Ten athletes were scanned at 2 separate occasions in random order, at rest and after 2 h of endurance running (21.5 +/- 4.7 km). Binding kinetics of [(18)F]FDPN were quantified by basis pursuit denoising (DEPICT software). Statistical parametric mapping (SPM2) was used for voxelwise analyses to determine relative changes in ligand binding after running and correlations of opioid binding with euphoria ratings. Reductions in opioid receptor availability were identified preferentially in prefrontal and limbic/paralimbic brain structures. The level of euphoria was significantly increased after running and was inversely correlated with opioid binding in prefrontal/orbitofrontal cortices, the anterior cingulate cortex, bilateral insula, parainsular cortex, and temporoparietal regions. These findings support the "opioid theory" of the runner's high and suggest region-specific effects in frontolimbic brain areas that are involved in the processing of affective states and mood.
Previous research has shown broad relationships between personality and dance, but the relationship between personality and specific structural features of music has not been explored. The current study explores the influence of personality and trait empathy on dancers' responsiveness to small tempo differences between otherwise musically identical stimuli, measured by difference in the amount in acceleration of key joints. Thirty participants were recorded using motion capture while dancing to excerpts from six popular songs that were time-stretched to be slightly faster or slower than their original tempi. Analysis revealed that higher conscientiousness and lower extraversion both correlated with greater responsiveness to tempo change. Partial correlation analysis revealed that conscientiousness remained significantly correlated with responsiveness when extraversion was controlled, but not vice versa. No effect of empathy was found. Implications are discussed.
The Flow State Scale-2 (FSS-2) and Dispositional Flow Scale-2 (DFS-2) are presented as two self-report instruments designed to assess flow experiences in physical activity. Item modifications were made to the original versions of these scales in order to improve the measurement of some of the flow dimensions. Confirmatory factor analyses of an item identification and a cross-validation sample demonstrated a good fit of the new scales. There was support for both a 9-first-order factor model and a higher order model with a global flow factor. The item identification sample yielded mean item loadings on the first-order factor of .78 for the FSS-2 and .77 for the DFS-2. Reliability estimates ranged from .80 to .90 for the FSS-2, and .81 to .90 for the DFS-2. In the cross-validation sample, mean item loadings on the first-order factor were .80 for the FSS-2, and .73 for the DFS-2. Reliability estimates ranged between .80 to .92 for the FSS-2 and .78 to .86 for the DFS-2. The scales are presented as ways of assessing flow experienced within a particular event (FSS-2) or the frequency of flow experiences in chosen physical activity in general (DFS-2).
It is useful to remember occasionally that life unfolds as a chain of subjective experiences. Whatever else life might be, the only evidence we have of it, the only direct data to which we have access, is the succession of events in consciousness. The quality of these experiences determines whether and to what extent life was worth living. © 2014 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht. All rights reserved.
The chameleon effect refers to nonconscious mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, facial expressions, and other behaviors of one's interaction partners, such that one's behavior passively rind unintentionally changes to match that of others in one's current social environment. The authors suggest that the mechanism involved is the perception-behavior link, the recently documented finding (e.g., J. A. Bargh, M. Chen, & L. Burrows, 1996) that the mere perception of another' s behavior automatically increases the likelihood of engaging in that behavior oneself Experiment 1 showed that the motor behavior of participants unintentionally matched that of strangers with whom they worked on a task. Experiment 2 had confederates mimic the posture and movements of participants and showed that mimicry facilitates the smoothness of interactions and increases liking between interaction partners. Experiment 3 showed that dispositionally empathic individuals exhibit the chameleon effect to a greater extent than do other people.
One of the major reasons why people find music so enjoyable is its emotional impact. Creating emotion-based playlists is a natural way of organizing music. The usability of online music streaming services could be greatly improved by developing emotion-based access methods, and automatic music emotion recognition (MER) is the most quick and feasible way of achieving it. When resorting to music for emotional regulation purposes, users are interested in the MER method to predict their induced, or felt emotion. The progress of MER in this area is impeded by the absence of publicly accessible ground-truth data on musically induced emotion. Also, there is no consensus on the question which emotional model best fits the demands of the users and can provide an unambiguous linguistic framework to describe musical emotions. In this paper we address these problems by creating a sizeable publicly available dataset of 400 musical excerpts from four genres annotated with induced emotion. We collected the data using an online “game with a purpose” Emotify, which attracted a big and varied sample of participants. We employed a nine item domain-specific emotional model GEMS (Geneva Emotional Music Scale). In this paper we analyze the collected data and report agreement of participants on different categories of GEMS. We also analyze influence of extra-musical factors on induced emotion (gender, mood, music preferences). We suggest that modifications in GEMS model are necessary.
The assignment of a rhythmic interpretation to a piece of metrical music calls for the postulation of an underlying meter and the parsing of the note values according to this meter. In this article we develop the implications of this view, which include the following propositions. 1. Any given sequence of note values is in principle rhythmically ambiguous, although this ambiguity is seldom apparent to the listener. 2. In choosing a rhythmic interpretation for a given note sequence the listener seems to be guided by a strong assumption: if the sequence can be interpreted as the realization of an unsyncopated passage, then that is how he will interpret it. 3. Phrasing can make an important difference to the rhythmic interpretation that the listener assigns to a given sequence. Phrasing can therefore serve a structural function as well as a purely ornamental one.
Developed and validated the Flow State Scale (FSS), a measure of flow in sport and physical activity settings. The 9 FSS scales of the 36-item instrument represent the dimensions of flow, and each scale is measured by 4 items. Internal consistency estimates for the 9 FSS scales were reasonable for administration of the scale to 394 athletes (aged 14–50 yrs) from the US and Australia. Confirmatory factor analyses supported the 9 scales. Consistent with the theoretical basis of the FSS, there was also support for a hierarchical model in which 1 global (higher order) flow factor explained correlations among the 9 first-order FSS factors. The FSS is appended. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Nine-hundred-and-fifty-two individuals completed the Big Five Inventory, and 60 extreme scorers were presented with 30 music excerpts from six popular genres. Music-induced movement was recorded by an optical motion-capture system, the data from which 55 postural, kinematic, and kinetic movement features were computed. These features were subsequently reduced to five principal components of movement representing Local Movement, Global Movement, Hand Flux, Head Speed, and Hand Distance. Multivariate Analyses revealed significant effects on these components of both personality and genre, as well as several interactions between the two. Each personality dimension was associated with a different pattern of movement characteristics, with Extraversion and Neuroticism eliciting the clearest relationships. Latin, Techno, and Rock music, meanwhile, most clearly elicited different movement characteristics.
This study attempted to show how autotelic people who live in a non-Western culture feel, behave, and think in their daily
lives. Using a sample of 315 Japanese college students, a series of correlation analyses were conducted between the frequency
of flow experience as an indicator of autotelic personality and a broad range of well-being measures. A distribution analysis
revealed that on average Japanese college students experienced flow more than a “few times a year,” but less than “once a
month.” In the examination of relations between flow and well-being measures, autotelic Japanese college students, or those
who experienced flow more often in their daily lives, were more likely to show higher self-esteem and lower anxiety, use active
coping strategies more often and use passive coping strategies less often, as compared to their less autotelic counterparts.
They were more likely to report active commitments to college life, search for future career, and daily activities in general.
They also reported more Jujitsu-kan, a Japanese sense of fulfillment, and greater satisfaction with their lives. Implications
of these findings are discussed in terms of what experiencing flow means and what effects flow potentially has for college
students in a non-Western culture.
KeywordsFlow experience-Autotelic personality-Culture-Well-being-Japanese college students
Physically active individuals have lower rates of morbidity and mortality, and recent evidence indicates that physical activity may be particularly beneficial to those experiencing chronic stress. The tendency to ruminate increases and prolongs physiological stress responses, including hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis responses as indexed by cortisol reactivity to stressful experiences. We examined the association between ruminating in response to a laboratory stressor task and HPA axis reactivity and recovery and examined whether a physically active life-style moderates the associations between rumination and cortisol output trajectories.
Forty-six postmenopausal women underwent the Trier Social Stress Test, whereas salivary cortisol was repeatedly measured. Twenty-five minutes after the end of the stressor, participants reported level of rumination in response to the stress.
Findings indicate that physical activity moderated the initial rate (B = -0.10, standard error = 0.04, p < .05) and curvature (B = -0.03, standard error = 0.01, p = .06) of the relationship between rumination and log-transformed cortisol trajectory. Among sedentary participants, those who responded to the stressor with higher levels of rumination had a more rapid initial increase in cortisol level (0.26 versus 0.21, p < .001), a later peak in cortisol reactivity (56 versus 39 minutes), and a delayed recovery from stress (curvature: -0.07 versus -0.08, p < .001) compared with those with lower levels of rumination. In active participants, cortisol trajectories were equivalent, regardless of the level of rumination.
In sum, individuals who maintain a physically active life-style may be protected against the effects of rumination on HPA axis reactivity to and recovery from acute stress.
We investigate non-verbal communication through expressive body movement and musical sound, to reveal higher cognitive processes involved in the integration of emotion from multiple sensory modalities. Participants heard, saw, or both heard and saw recordings of a Stravinsky solo clarinet piece, performed with three distinct expressive styles: restrained, standard, and exaggerated intention. Participants used a 5-point Likert scale to rate each performance on 19 different emotional qualities. The data analysis revealed that variations in expressive intention had their greatest impact when the performances could be seen; the ratings from participants who could only hear the performances were the same across the three expressive styles. Evidence was also found for an interaction effect leading to an emergent property, intensity of positive emotion, when participants both heard and saw the musical performances. An exploratory factor analysis revealed orthogonal dimensions for positive and negative emotions, which may account for the subjective experience that many listeners report of having multi-valent or complex reactions to music, such as "bittersweet."
To investigate whether chronic vigorous exercising is related to improved sleep and psychological functioning, and whether this association varies with gender. Both lay and scientific opinions hold that physical activity is an efficient remedy and preventative measure for poor sleep. However, empirical evidence on adolescents is very limited.
A total of 434 adolescents (258 athletes, 176 controls; mean age 17.2 years) took part in the study. Weekly hours spent exercising were 17.69 hours and 4.69 hours, respectively. To assess sleep patterns and psychological functioning, participants completed a sleep log for 7 consecutive days and several self-rating questionnaires.
Compared with controls, athletes reported better sleep patterns including higher sleep quality, shortened sleep onset latency, and fewer awakenings after sleep onset, as well as less tiredness and increased concentration during the day. Athletes reported significantly lower anxiety and fewer depressive symptoms. Compared with males, females reported fewer variations in sleep. Male controls had particularly unfavorable scores related to sleep and psychological functioning.
Findings suggest that chronic vigorous exercising is positively related to adolescents' sleep and psychological functioning. Results also indicate that males with low exercise levels are at risk for increased sleep complaints and poorer psychological functioning.
An in-depth investigation into flow state was conducted in order to understand how this optimal state is experienced by elite athletes. Twenty-eight elite-level athletes, representing 7 sports, were interviewed on their perceptions of flow state during performance of their sport. Csikszentmihalyi's (1990) model of the flow state was examined for its applicability to elite athletes. Correspondence was found between the dimensions of flow, as described by Csikszentmihalyi (1990), and the athletes' descriptions of their experience of flow; some dimensions received greater support through the qualitative analysis of the athletes' descriptions than did other dimensions. Those dimensions of flow most represented across the group's data were the autotelic experience of flow, total concentration on the task at hand, merging of action and awareness, and the paradox of control. The analyses provided a detailed, sport-specific picture of flow state in elite athletes.
We investigate the dynamics of sensory integration for perceiving musical performance, a complex natural behavior. Thirty musically trained participants saw, heard, or both saw and heard, performances by two clarinetists. All participants used a sliding potentiometer to make continuous judgments of tension (a measure correlated with emotional response) and continuous judgments of phrasing (a measure correlated with perceived musical structure) as performances were presented. The data analysis sought to reveal relations between the sensory modalities (vision and audition) and to quantify the effect of seeing the performances on participants' overall subjective experience of the music. In addition to traditional statistics, functional data analysis techniques were employed to analyze time-varying aspects of the data. The auditory and visual channels were found to convey similar experiences of phrasing but different experiences of tension through much of the performances. We found that visual information served both to augment and to reduce the experience of tension at different points in the musical piece (as revealed by functional linear modeling and functional significance testing). In addition, the musicians' movements served to extend the sense of phrasing, to cue the beginning of new phrases, to indicate musical interpretation, and to anticipate changes in emotional content. Evidence for an interaction effect suggests that there may exist an emergent quality when musical performances are both seen and heard. The investigation augments knowledge of human communicative processes spanning language and music, and involving multiple modalities of emotion and information transfer.
The Emotional Power of Music
- K.R. Scherer
- E. Coutinho
- Scherer