What Is the Mozart Effect?

Most of Mozart's works are pure, fresh, bright, and stable in rhythm, consistent with the unique physiological laws of the human body. This feature can stimulate positive emotions such as joy and joy, which in turn can promote the improvement of cognitive processing. .

Most of Mozart's works are pure, fresh, bright, and stable in rhythm, consistent with the unique physiological laws of the human body. This feature can stimulate positive emotions such as joy and joy, which in turn can promote the improvement of cognitive processing. .

It should be noted that the music of the "Mozart effect" is not just music that refers to Mozart himself, but music that refers to music in general. Most of these music have the same or similar musical structure as Mozart's music.

Chinese name

Mozart effect

Foreign name

Mozart Effect

Applied discipline

psychology

The production of the " Mozart effect " ^[1]

In 1993, Columbia University's Rothcher and the University of California's Gordon Shaw dared to make an assumption: there was a connection between music and spatial reasoning. They used a model of brain research structure proposed by Xiao in 1985 to solve this problem. This model of brain structure research proposed by Xiao is based on mathematical and electronic computer control theoretical models to try to solve the problem of how neural networks transmit information in one area of the brain to another area. It also uses visual stimulation materials. To describe certain neural firing patterns. Roscher and Shaw tried to extend their brain research model to another specific field of behavioral research, hoping to see how music has an effect on spatial reasoning. To this end, they conducted an experiment: 36 non-music majors were divided into three groups, and the independent variables were set: Mozart's "Piano Sonata in D Major", popular music, without any musical stimulus. The experimental method was simple Appreciation. After 10 minutes, the Stanford-Bina Intelligence Scale was used for the test. It was found that the students who listened to Mozart's music scored 8-9 percentage points higher than the other groups, but this effect lasted 10-15 minutes. Will disappear. Rothcher also believes that if you regularly listen to Mozart's music (or similar to Mozart's music), it will permanently improve this ability and affect life. The mass media in the United States have extensively rendered and publicized this experiment, which has aroused great interest. CDs about Mozart music in major record stores were quickly sold out, and eventually French doctor Luis Tomatis first The term "Mozart Effect" was coined. It should be noted that the music of the "Mozart effect" is not just music that refers to Mozart himself, but music that refers to music in general. Most of these music have the same or similar musical structure as Mozart's music. Roscher and Shaw's discovery caused great concern among researchers, and soon became a hot issue in music psychology. Some researchers have questioned the "Mozart effect", arguing that Mozart's music melody is smooth, euphoric, and can maximize people's happiness, which is conducive to solving complex problems. In fact, cognition determines emotions, and emotions also affect cognition. To a certain extent, they also have the same basis for physiological processing. Therefore, the "Mozart effect" needs to be explained from two aspects of cognition and emotion.

Research on the Brain Mechanism of the " Mozart Effect "

Before the "Mozart Effect" study, many people gave various explanations for the reasons why music is helpful for learning in other disciplines, and some studies have discussed the relationship between music and intelligence and other academic abilities, but they have some correlations. Correlational study can only seek the relationship between two or more variables, but cannot prove the cause-and-effect relationship, and Rothschild and Shaw's experiments are based on neuroscience. Related research in neuroscience believes that children's early experience determines the connection and apoptosis of brain cells (neurons). Because neural connections are the basis for the formation of various intelligences, children's brains must develop their potential to the limit , It is necessary to provide them with a wealth of early experience. Therefore, Rothcher believes that there is a neural triggering model in the human brain that serves to transfer information between different regions of the brain, but the rich structure of music itself activates the brain model, which is conducive to solving complex inference problems. According to neuroscientist Gison, the so-called "newbie" requires more energy to deal with a more difficult problem than the "expert". In this way, assuming that music teaching can improve spatial reasoning, according to relevant brain science theories, we can think that students with music education will consume less energy than students without music education. Neuroscientists believe that demonstrating the "Mozart effect", or the relationship between music and brain function, requires the use of corresponding technologies for further testing. The required technologies include the use of electroencephalography (EEG), magnetic resonance imaging (MR), and positron emission Tomography (PET), etc. The first to respond to the "Mozart Effect" were Thomas Flohr, David Miller, and Robert Peresllin. The experimental method they designed is basically the same as that of Rothschild and Shaw, but the subjects are all preschool children aged four or five. They were divided into two groups: music teaching (experimental group) and non-music teaching (comparative group). The two groups of subjects were tested for visual space problems during the seventh week and the tenth week. At the same time, EEG was used to observe and monitor brain activity. The results showed that there were significant differences between the two groups. Activity is low. According to Giessen's conclusion, participants with high cognitive efficiency had lower brain energy consumption, which was formed by music training. After the various components of music are processed in each brain area, they must also have certain connections with other brain areas. After a piece of music stimulus reaches the brain through processing and transmission in the auditory center, it stimulates related brain area functions, and then through the interconnection of synapses between the brain areas and the role of the corpus callosum between the two hemispheres, it can be better processed and identified. The entire musical composition and structure. Among the relevant brain regions stimulated by music, some are also responsible for other cognitive processing, such as the left occipital lobe plays a role in symbol decoding, and the prefrontal lobe performs the ability to process, integrate, coordinate, and control music information. Therefore, the brain regions are connected and interact with each other through synapses, which is conducive to the improvement of the overall behavior level.

In another EEG experiment, it was found that when the subjects listened to music, the brain wave frequency was lower and the amplitude was increased, which produced a significant EEG response. Walker found that when listening to pleasant and cheerful music, the information exchange between the two hemispheres of the brain increased, especially the activity of the frontal lobe increased, especially in the enhancement of alpha waves, which did not occur in music with discordant melody. This shows that cheerful music strengthens the information exchange between the two hemispheres, and discordant music is contrary to the physiological laws of the human body and is not conducive to the exchange of information between the two hemispheres. Using EEG observations, Pist found that the brain areas (superior temporal and subfrontal gyrus) responsible for the processing of musical melody are connected to each other at the speed of tens of thousands of times per second under the stimulation of music, and they also rapidly generate resonance interaction functions. And release the alpha wave. Cheerful music not only enhances the information exchange between the two hemispheres of the brain. Through further understanding and analysis of the structure of a lot of cheerful music, it is found that the time band (rhythm, melody) in the music can be almost symmetrical with the brain frequency. Many functions of the nervous system, such as the frequency of brain waves in a quiet and relaxed state, have a cycle of 30 seconds, and cheerful music will have a peak every 30 seconds, so this regularly repeated melody is stimulated in the human brain The biggest response. In recent years, foreign research data show that changes in brain waves are closely related to human psychological activity. Cheerful music makes people happy, relaxed, and highly active, which promotes a significant increase in alpha waves, while noise and discordant music have no such changes. In addition, the alpha wave at this time is mainly concentrated in the forehead area of the brain. Other studies have also shown that changes in EEG when listening to music are also mainly concentrated in the forehead area.

The theoretical explanation of " Mozart effect "

The ultimate purpose of music is to enable people to obtain a certain emotional experience, and this emotional experience depends on the recognition of various components of music. Pitch, melody and rhythm are the main parts that determine the mood of music: stable rhythm, harmonious melody, and pitch Changing music stimulates positive emotions, and vice versa. In addition, from the perspective of the physiological structure of the brain, some parts participate in the cognitive processing of music but not in the emotional processing of music, but the information is transmitted to the limbic system through the connection of synapses to generate emotional responses. Some parts are involved in both music cognitive processing and music emotional processing. For example, the prefrontal cortex is an important area for integrating music cognitive information and emotional information. It has a strong ability to coordinate and control complex behaviors and can establish deeper emotions. Connotation. The basal ganglia not only participates in the processing of positive emotional information; it also has cognitive and memory functions such as information selection and decision-making. It can register and process positive content in music and help to recall and reproduce pleasant events to generate Emotional experience and behavior. Most of Mozart's works are pure, fresh, bright, and stable in rhythm, consistent with the unique physiological laws of the human body. This feature can stimulate positive emotions such as joy and joy, which in turn can promote the improvement of cognitive processing. This is the theoretical explanation of the "Mozart effect". ^[2]

Other views

The discussion about the "Mozart effect" was an earlier article published in the "Nature" magazine in 1993, which introduced that listening to ten minutes of Mozart's piano sonata k.448 can improve people's performance in IQ tests, especially It is the ability of spatial reasoning. Many people have reduced this argument to: Listening to music makes people smarter. However, the current mainstream international opinion believes that the experimental design of this article is not rigorous. More experiments have proved that this effect does not exist, and the Mozart effect is false. ^[1]