💾 Archived View for gmi.noulin.net › mobileNews › 1314.gmi captured on 2023-09-08 at 18:50:50. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
⬅️ Previous capture (2023-01-29)
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
2009-07-29 15:04:39
The Mozart effect can refer to:
induce a short-term improvement on the performance of certain kinds of mental
tasks known as "spatial-temporal reasoning;"[1]
makes you smarter", or that early childhood exposure to classical music has a
beneficial effect on mental development;
which are claimed to harness the effect for a variety of purposes. The
trademark owner, Don Campbell, Inc.,[2] claims benefits far beyond improving
spatio-temporal reasoning or raising intelligence, defining the mark as "an
inclusive term signifying the transformational powers of music in health,
education, and well-being."
The term was first coined by Alfred A. Tomatis who used Mozart's music as the
listening stimulus in his work attempting to cure a variety of disorders. The
approach has been popularized in a book by Don Campbell, and is based on an
experiment published in Nature suggesting that listening to Mozart temporarily
boosted students' IQ by 8 to 9 points.[3] As a result, the Governor of Georgia,
Zell Miller, proposed a budget to provide every child born in Georgia with a CD
of classical music.
Alfred A. Tomatis
The concept of the "Mozart effect" was described by French researcher, Dr.
Alfred A. Tomatis in his 1991 book Pourquoi Mozart?. He used the music of
Mozart in his efforts to "retrain" the ear, and believed that listening to the
music presented at differing frequencies helped the ear, and promoted healing
and the development of the brain.
[edit] Rauscher et al. 1993 study
Rauscher, Shaw, and Ky (1993) investigated the effect of listening to music by
Mozart on spatial reasoning, and the results were published in Nature. They
gave research participants one of three standard tests of abstract spatial
reasoning after they had experienced each of three listening conditions: a
sonata by Mozart, repetitive relaxation music, and silence. The authors found
that the mean standard age scores converted into IQ scores were 8 to 9 points
higher after the participants had listened to the music than after either of
the other two conditions.[4]
Rauscher et al. show that the enhancing effect of the music condition is only
temporary: no student had effects extending beyond the 15-minute period in
which they were tested. The study makes no statement of an increase in IQ in
general, but in participants' spatial intelligence scores.[4]
[edit] Popularization
While Rauscher et al. only showed an increase in 'spatial intelligence', the
results were popularly interpreted as an increase in general IQ. This
misconception, and the fact that the music used in the study was by Mozart, had
an obvious appeal to those who valued this music; the Mozart effect was thus
widely reported. In 1994, New York Times music columnist, Alex Ross, wrote in a
light-hearted article, "researchers [Rauscher and Shaw] have determined that
listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter," and presented this as the
final piece of evidence that Mozart has dethroned Beethoven as "the world's
greatest composer." A 1997 Boston Globe article mentioned some of the Rauscher
and Shaw results. It described one study in which three- and four-year-olds who
were given eight months of private piano lessons scored 34 percent higher on
tests of spatio-temporal reasoning than control groups given computer lessons,
singing lessons, and no training.
The 1997 book by Don Campbell, "The Mozart Effect: Tapping the Power of Music
to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Mind, and Unlock the Creative Spirit",
discusses the theory that listening to Mozart (especially the piano concertos)
may temporarily increase one's IQ and produce many other beneficial effects on
mental function. Campbell recommends playing specially selected classical music
to infants, in the expectation that it will benefit their mental development.
These theories are controversial. The relationship of sound and music (both
played and listened to) to cognitive function and various physiological metrics
has been explored in studies with no definitive results. After The Mozart
Effect, Campbell wrote a follow-up book, The Mozart Effect For Children, and
created related products. Among these are collections of music that he states
harness the Mozart effect to enhance "deep rest and rejuvenation",
"intelligence and learning", and "creativity and imagination". Campbell defines
the term as "an inclusive term signifying the transformational powers of music
in health, education, and well-being. It represents the general use of music to
reduce stress, depression, or anxiety; induce relaxation or sleep; activate the
body; and improve memory or awareness. Innovative and experimental uses of
music and sound can improve listening disorders, dyslexia, attention deficit
disorder, autism, and other mental and physical disorders and diseases".[5]
Political impact
The popular impact of the theory was demonstrated on January 13, 1998, when
Zell Miller, governor of Georgia, announced that his proposed state budget
would include $105,000 a year to provide every child born in Georgia with a
tape or CD of classical music. Miller stated "No one questions that listening
to music at a very early age affects the spatial-temporal reasoning that
underlies math and engineering and even chess." Miller played legislators some
of Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" on a tape recorder and asked "Now, don't you feel
smarter already?" Miller asked Yoel Levi, music director of the Atlanta
Symphony, to compile a collection of classical pieces that should be included.
State representative Homer M. DeLoach said "I asked about the possibility of
including some Charlie Daniels or something like that, but they said they
thought the classical music has a greater positive impact. Having never studied
those impacts too much, I guess I'll just have to take their word for that."[6]
Limitations of the effect
Popular presentations of the "Mozart effect", including Alex Ross's comment
that "listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter" and Zell Miller's "don't
you feel smarter" query to the Georgia legislature, almost always tie it to
"intelligence". Rauscher, one of the original researchers, has disclaimed this
idea. In a 1999 reply, published together with an article challenging the
effect,[7] she wrote (emphasis added):
Our results on the effects of listening to Mozart s Sonata for Two Pianos in D
Major K. 448 on spatial temporal task performance have generated much interest
but several misconceptions, many of which are reflected in attempts to
replicate the research. The comments by Chabris and Steele et al. echo the most
common of these: that listening to Mozart enhances intelligence. We made no
such claim. The effect is limited to spatial temporal tasks involving mental
imagery and temporal ordering.
On efforts like Miller's budget proposal, and the press attention surrounding
the effect, Rauscher has said, "I don't think it can hurt. I'm all for exposing
children to wonderful cultural experiences. But I do think the money could be
better spent on music education programs."[8]
Other research
Another experiment that agrees with the claim was made by Bellarmine College.
To make sure the Mozart effect was consistent, The Department of Psychology at
Bellarmine College tested the spatial reasoning of the participants in a study
by having them complete pencil-and-paper mazes of varying complexity. The
students were given eight minutes to complete as many mazes as possible. If the
Mozart effect is replicable, then the participant s performances on the mazes
should be enhanced after listening to Mozart's music relative to the other two
listening conditions. Of the 22 volunteers, the average student completed 2.68
mazes in 8 minutes after listening to Mozart s music. After listening to
different types of music, the average student only completed 2.2 mazes, and
after being in silence, the average student completed 1.73 mazes.[9]
Other researchers argue that The Mozart Effect is only an artifact of the
short-term effects of music listening on mood and arousal. William Forde
Thompson, Gabriela Husain, and Glenn Schellenberg (2001) tested the Mozart
effect on 24 graduate and undergraduate students with a range of musical
background (average of 2.75 years of formal music lessons). The participants
listened to either Mozart s Piano Sonata in D major (K.448), or to "Albinoni's
Adagio In G Minor". The Mozart sonata contrasts with the Adagio in being more
upbeat and energetic than the slower, sadder Adagio. The participants then
performed the same spatial-temporal task that was administered in the original
study by Rauscher and colleagues, called the "Paper Folding and Cutting" task,
or PF&C. Participants then completed a standard battery for evaluating mood and
arousal, called the "Profile of Mood States". They also provided simple ratings
of their mood and energy levels on a scale from 1 to 7. Finally, they also
rated how much they enjoyed the music that they heard.
The participants performed significantly better on the spatial-temporal task
after listening to Mozart s sonata than after listening to the Adagio. However,
this apparent benefit disappeared when differences in mood and arousal were
held constant by statistical means.[10]
Mozart's Sonata for Two Pianos in D major K.448 has also been known to reduce
the number of seizures that people with epilepsy have. The University of
Illinois Medical Center did an experiment on 29 epileptic patients. After
listening to the piece for up to 300 seconds, 23 of the 29 patients experienced
significant decreases in epileptiform activity, even from patients in comas.
They are not certain if this effect is immediate or if it requires 40-300
seconds to become apparent.[11]
Music has different effects on different people and because of this,
researchers continue to test if the Mozart effect is real, and if any other
pieces have the same effect.[4]
In addition, music has been evaluated to see if it has other properties. The
April 2001 edition of Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine assessed the
possible health benefits of the music of Mozart.[12] John Jenkins played Sonata
K 448 to patients with epilepsy and found a decrease in epileptiform activity.
According to the British Epilepsy Organization, research has suggested that
apart from Mozart's K 448 and K 488, only one other piece of music has been
found to have a similar effect; a song by the Greek composer Yanni, entitled
"Acroyali/Standing in Motion" (version from Yanni Live at the Acropolis).[12]
It was determined to have the "Mozart effect", by the Journal of the Royal
Society of Medicine because it was similar to Mozart's K 448 in tempo,
structure, melodic and harmonic consonance and predictability.[12][13]
Chabris and Steele
The existence of the Mozart effect was challenged by two teams of researchers
in 1999: Christopher F. Chabris, and Kenneth M. Steele et al. in a pair of
papers published together under the title "Prelude or Requiem for the 'Mozart
Effect'?" Chabris stated that his meta-analysis demonstrated "that any
cognitive enhancement is small and does not reflect any change in IQ or
reasoning ability in general, but instead derives entirely from performance on
one specific type of cognitive task and has a simple neuropsychological
explanation", called "enjoyment arousal". For example, he cites a study that
found that "listening either to Mozart or to a passage from a Stephen King
story enhanced subjects performance in paper folding and cutting (one of the
tests frequently employed by Rauscher and Shaw) but only for those who enjoyed
what they heard". Steele et al. found that "listening to Mozart produced a
3-point increase relative to silence in one experiment and a 4-point decrease
in the other experiment".[7]
Bridget and Cuevas
Even if music improves performance in some settings and on some tasks, there is
evidence that the effect is not general in the sense that it does not apply in
other tasks. Bridget and Cuevas (2000) found that, when compared to a no-music
condition, listening to music by Bach or Mozart for 10 minutes produced no
effect on subsequent mathematical problem solving performance.[14]
German Research Ministry
A report published by the German Research Ministry in 2006 and analyzing over
300 published articles on music and intelligence concluded that "... passively
listening to Mozart or indeed any other music you enjoy does not make you
smarter. But more studies should be done to find out whether music lessons
could raise your child's IQ in the long term".[15] [16]
University of Wisconsin, Department of Psychology
A study of rats indicated a tangible demonstration of musical enjoyment versus
a physical response to the Mozart Sonata. A number of rats were exposed in
utero plus 60 days post-partum to one of the following: complex music (Mozart
Piano Sonata in D major (K.448)), minimalist music (a Philip Glass
composition), white noise or silence, and were then tested for five days, three
trials per day, in a multiple T-maze. By Day 3, the rats exposed to the Mozart
music completed the maze more rapidly and with fewer errors than the rats in
the other groups. The difference increased in magnitude through Day 5. This
suggests that repeated exposure to complex music induces improved
spatial-temporal learning in rats.[17][18]
Thompson, Schellenberg, Husain
Research by William Forde Thompson, Glenn Schellenberg, and Gabriela Husain
(University of Toronto) suggests that the Mozart effect can be attributed to
temporary changes in mood and arousal that result from prolonged exposure to
music (e.g., 8 10 minutes). Not all music generates the Mozart effect, however.
The music must be perceived as having an energetic and positive emotional
quality.[19]