All people, almost without exception, love listening to music. Some younger people always wear headphones on the subway, while older people rarely turn off the radio in the car. Both are guided by personal tastes, habits and psychological state at the time of listening to music. But few people are fully aware of how rhythms and melodies affect the psychological and moral state.

After all, music can have both a relaxing, calming effect, and vice versa - give strength and vigor, feed with energy. Almost any piece of music– from modern relatively “simple” melodies to classical works exerts its influence on the psyche of the listener.

Researchers and specialists, more accurately, and ordinary amateurs to a lesser extent, divide music into styles and directions. It is difficult, almost impossible, to count and determine all of them. But there are some common features different types music is seen, or rather, heard by everyone. Is it possible to try to analyze the influence of different music on the human psyche? IN general outline- yes. If you don't take subtleties like different styles contemporary performers and groups that, within the same direction, try to look original without changing anything in essence. In order to draw boundaries, we can distinguish four directions that are most different from each other. These are rock, pop music, jazz and classical.

What is rock, and why do many people view it negatively?

Several decades ago, there was an opinion among psychologists that rock music had a negative impact on the psyche due to its distinctive features: ostentatious aggressiveness or, conversely, gloomy melancholy. It was believed that rock contributed to the depressive tendencies of adolescents, interfered with their socialization and alienated them from the outside world. However, as often happens, researchers confused causes and effects.

Today it is generally accepted that destructive behavior cannot be caused by music. Rather, rock music is an indicator of life problems that are experienced excessively emotionally at a young age. Such a teenager is not drawn to cheerful rhythms, preferring “heavier” music. Often, by the way, finding consolation in it or even solving some of the psycho-emotional problems with its help.

That is, problems in a teenager’s relationships with parents or peers, lack of adequate attention from parents or conflicts with classmates, all this can cause withdrawal. And the consequence, the demonstration of such an attitude towards life, will be a tendency towards aggressive or depressive rock music. It can both correspond to his psychological state and, on the contrary, give strength, energy, excite and “turn on”.

How does popular music affect the psyche?

Traditionally, pop music refers to works whose main attraction for the listener is simplicity: both melody and lyrics. Sometimes melodies are called catchy. This is due to the fact that the authors specifically write pop music in such a way that the words and rhythms are remembered as simply as possible. This suggests that pop music does not have a sharply stimulating effect on the psyche, but promotes relaxation and distraction from “complex” thoughts. Here lies the peculiarity of the influence of popular music on the psyche.

And we are not even talking about the fact that pop music is “stupid.” In any case, it cannot be an important reason why a person can stop or limit his intellectual development. Rather, it may be that a traditionally exploited theme in pop music is romantic relationships.

People who lack such emotions in life tend to compensate for their lack with the help of pop music. And since the main audience of songs about “love-carrots” are teenage girls, the authors of such works do not set themselves the task of awakening too strong emotions in the listener or promoting his spiritual growth.

Why does jazz stand alone?

Jazz is one of the most unique and original styles in the history of music. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly, it is listened to by those who have a fairly large “baggage” of listened to music of various styles. Often such people themselves are no strangers to music or vocal lessons. Therefore, jazz cannot have any negative impact on the listener’s psyche. We can say that he is listened to by those prepared in musically fans and listen with purpose. Therefore, jazz can both relax and invigorate the listener, depending on what exactly the jazz lover wants to achieve with music.

As mentioned above, listeners often jazz concerts or recordings themselves are related to music. Therefore, sometimes listening to improvisations with musical instruments(and the performance of jazz is much more often associated with improvisation than other styles), the listener puts himself in the place of the musician, experiencing a completely different pleasure than when listening to rock or pop music.

What's good about classical music?

According to many psychology experts, classical music has the most “useful” influence on the psyche. It has a beneficial effect on the emotional background, feelings and sensations. With some habit, classical music even helps eliminate depression and stress. This version is also supported by the fact that obstetrics specialists often recommend V.A. Mozart for small children or even pregnant women.

Each of us has our own taste in music. Listening to our favorite music, we relax, or, on the contrary, we feel sad. I wonder how it affects different music per person?

Now let's take a look and figure it out.

Classic
Sounds of Mozart. Scientists conducted a study that included different people music by Mozart and using magnetic resonance to obtain an image of the activity of areas of the human brain. It was found that absolutely all areas of the brain are activated, including vision and motor coordination. All this includes the process of consciousness in which a person develops spatial thinking.
Otolaryngologist Tomatis Alfred confirmed this fact and proved it from a scientific point of view. The fact is that high-frequency sounds, which vary within 5-8 thousand Hz, activate human brain activity. It is this kind of work that can improve a person’s memory and positively influence the general state of mind.

Hard rock
Music programs a person, as proven by scientists from Britain. Constantly listening to low-frequency vibrations, bass guitar and repetitive rhythms can negatively affect your psyche. It's about about rock music and hard rock. Not only the words in the song, but also the sound itself have a serious impact on a person, destroying generally accepted values, and inspiring a person to senseless and extremely dangerous actions. Rock music is especially dangerous for teenagers and unformed individuals who are susceptible to influence. Teenagers who often listen to rock music have problems at school, at home, with peers and with parents. It seems to them that no one needs them and no one understands them. Some people call “rock” suicide music, so we didn’t post “rock music”.

Military compositions
During combat operations, musical accompaniment plays an important role. Suvorov also said that music triples the army. Military songs can unite an entire people, instill confidence in tomorrow and help to grieve for the dead. During the Great Patriotic War, soldiers and fighters, officers and generals were given strength by music and songs.

Popular music
Pop or “pop music” is the most widespread genre in the world. Experts are still arguing about the influence on the consciousness of the individual. It would seem that simple texts and easy sounding do not have any impact, but this is not at all the case. Such sounds have a positive effect on people who lack romance, have not yet found their soul mate and feel unwanted. But for people of science and creative personalities- this is extremely undesirable music that overloads the brain and, ultimately, leads to degradation. Naturally, you will not begin to degrade overnight, but over time, such music will leave its mark on your perception in the world and society.

Jazz
Jazz helps you relax and get away from pressing problems. A person who listens to jazz simply dissolves in it. There's nothing wrong with that. If you are looking peace of mind If you want to relax or just relax, be sure to listen to jazz, and you will like it.

Rap
Rap has a detrimental effect on a person. People who constantly listen to rap show a significant decrease in brain activity. Experts tested people who constantly listen to rap and it turned out that their IQ is significantly lower than that of other people. And the words in the song evoke negative emotions that are completely unnecessary for a person. For some, rap, on the contrary, motivates and evokes positive emotions. It all depends on the person and his lifestyle.

Style selection
Music that is attractive and to a person’s liking reflects his reality inner world. The choice of music style is strictly individual and speaks about the character and temperament of a person, and also shows the individual’s lifestyle. Often the choice of music to listen to is related to the emotional state.

If you are interested, do a little experiment - listen to fragments of music of different styles and then count your heart beats per minute. You will see that your heart rate changes greatly depending on the tempo of the music.

What kind of music do you like?

If you miss the long-winded introductions about positive impact classical music and details of various studies, we get the following. In psychology there is such a term as “AUDITORY PATHWAY”. This is the path from the beginning of the sound to the result, which is achieved by irritating one or more nerve centers of the brain. Every word, piece of music or just sound has its own auditory pathways. Accordingly, sounds that differ in frequency, rhythm, timbre, and vibration have different effects on a person, because this is directly related to the rhythms of the brain.

Receiving audio information through the organs of hearing, the brain analyzes it by comparing it with its own rhythms. Each person has rhythms at their own frequency. This is why tastes in music are so different. Let's go through the genres.

Rock music.

In many classical works we find information about the harmful effects of rock and similar music on the body. Not surprisingly, in the not-so-distant 80s and earlier, rockers were equated almost to Satanists. In the minds of the “ancestors” the image of terrible, prone to violence, practically asocial personalities was strengthened (which we see in our Nikita), therefore in those years it was common for cultured and educated people to write only “correct” articles.

However, later a curious fact about rock music was discovered - scientists have proven that rockers have the highest IQ of all music lovers.

Modern rock music uses frequencies that affect the brain like narcotic substances, as they combine from ultra-low frequencies of 15-30 hertz to ultra-high frequencies of up to 80,000 hertz. This greatly excites the human nervous system.

The strength of sound also plays a role here. Our ear in the best possible way perceives sound at 55-60 decibels. A sound of 70 decibels is considered loud. The sound volume at the site, where walls with powerful speakers used during rock concerts are installed, reaches 120 dB, and in the middle of the site up to 140-160 dB. (120 dB corresponds to the volume of the roar of a jet plane taking off in close proximity, and the average values ​​​​for a player with headphones are 80-110 dB). In this situation, the adrenal glands also secrete a stress hormone - adrenaline. You can imagine the effect on the body. But why it is generally accepted that this is bad, I don’t know. Personally, I am for adrenaline and all sorts of psycho-glitches - we already deal with them every day, so why divide them into “good” and “bad”? This is stupid!

Electronic music, trance

Here, of course, the main role belongs to rhythm. Rhythm is generally one of the most powerful ways of influencing the human body. Simple but powerful rhythms force a person to respond (movements to the rhythm), from ecstasy to hallucinations, from hysteria to loss of consciousness.

The influence of pop music on a person

Well, what can you say about her? Pop music often adapts to the heart rate and slows it down rather than vice versa, unless of course it is music for a party. I don’t see much psychotropism in this music, and I don’t see any evidence to the contrary either. Here the effect is more “pleasant” - “not pleasant”. The words resonate or not. In pop music, music has never been a strong point. In general, it is “believed” that popular music has an extremely negative effect on intelligence. No offense to anyone, but I personally have been convinced of this more than once - it’s called “sliding” for a reason...

Jazz music influence

Jazz has virtually no effect on a person’s mental state. He just relaxes in the "waves" of this musical direction. But relaxation very quickly “evaporates” and dissolves in the melody of the music. You too can dissolve with them. But on one very small condition. Condition: this music is close to you. That’s why he has so few followers, that’s why this is music of taste, but I want to note that it’s excellent, because in this music a person is not looking for sensations, he enjoys the music itself

The influence of classical music on a person

All the most best words Of course, they give themselves over to this musical formula. There is an opinion that classic style music is ideal for the individual and society as a whole. It harmonizes feelings, thoughts, mind, emotions, and drives away all sorrows from you. Whatever you listen to, find something of your own in classical or contemporary instrumentals. How good it is, you will find enough information on the net.

The influence of rap and hip-hop style on the psyche

In turnip, rhythm and words are in the foreground. Those. he can trance in his own way. But at the same time, the leading role here is given to the texts and the key is rather their subtext. I love rap, but its influence is more at the pop level - words decide everything, there is no sound depth here. They make you freeze, and they can turn the essence of the rhythm into fun.

Horror movie soundtracks.

The main purpose of music for these films is to evoke fear, unpleasant emotions and create tension. To achieve this goal, periodic structures and their synchronization must be disrupted in this music. Horror films can create fear and anxiety in many people, the main thing is to have more tension and surprise in the sounds.

Something like that. Let’s not forget that music affects a person’s psyche depending on what kind of person he is. He chooses what is closest to him. Actually, that’s why you can often recognize a person’s characteristics through music. Personally, if I want to learn more about a person, I definitely look at his audio recordings. There is something to pull out from his psychotype.

By the way, another fact has been established that in people, rabbits, cats, guinea pigs and dogs, under the influence of music, blood pressure can change, the heart rate can increase, and the rhythm and depth of respiratory movements can decrease, up to a complete stop of breathing. Among other dogs, for some reason these changes are stronger in dogs from the Pinscher breed group than in other dogs. I don't know why, but it's interesting.

Jazz touches many sides human life: from the deep emotional feelings of an individual listener to a culture of thinking on a large scale. As one of the brightest trends in art, jazz music has inspired people for decades to undertake numerous historical musical studies, progressive methods in composing jazz improvisations, and educational activities; this is where the great influence of jazz lies.

Taking into account that, according to the most common description of the concept, “culture of thinking” is a certain synthesis of acquired and improved human qualities, we will highlight the most important of them and trace the relationship of the influence of jazz on their development.

The influence of jazz from a scientific point of view

According to the doctor Robert J. Zatorre from the Montreal Neurological Institute, jazz is a natural and comfortable part of everyday human activity, but at the same time, one of the most complex and demanding music for the brain.

In other words, thanks to complex trends in jazz, especially such as avant-garde, mainstream, bebop, hard bop, our brain works several times more actively in order to understand changes in musical harmony, instrumental solo improvisations. In addition to the above, these jazz styles require excellent reaction speed and constant executive control, and as a result, the neural connections of the brain improve, which is what Dr. Robert Zatorr explores in his scientific works:

We examine the effects of music on cognitive properties of the brain and auditory areas, focusing on special attention studying the interactions between these systems in a musical context.

Candidate of Cultural Sciences Konstantin Ushakov created an entire dissertation, in which a significant part is devoted to the direct influence and evolution of jazz itself and, accordingly, to changes in the cultural thinking of people.

The scientist describes and discusses in detail about jazz from the time of its formation to its state today, while simultaneously analyzing each turning point in history. Jazz in its influence is able to combine several accents that improve a person’s mental abilities: learning ability, speed of reaction, innovative approach and the development of logical thinking.

The methodological basis of the study was chosen to be a problem-logical method. It allowed us to consider the features of jazz as a cultural phenomenon and identify the elements that characterize it. musical language and aesthetics, explore the patterns, mechanisms of the dynamics of jazz and the directions of its evolution, determine the features of the transformation of jazz in Russia and study the possibility of updating the domestic musical culture, through jazz innovation.

Perhaps one of the major “achievements” of jazz is the powerful spiritual power it possesses! Jazz revolutionized racial segregation, reconciling people of different races and colors and uniting them, without belittling the merits of both sides. Rooted in its origins, jazz music owes its existence to the black people whose talents helped create this movement, and creative power was able to overcome the majority human weaknesses and passions.

So, we realize that, among other things, jazz helps people get rid of their moral shortcomings, which in turn leads to the next stage of personal development - calmness. This concept can mean a lot, but it is worth highlighting such factors as moral stability and a prevailing positive attitude.

Of course, not all people who listen to jazz music are calm and balanced. However, the mental endurance of such individuals is much higher than that of those who prefer, for example, heavy music.

This explains a large proportion of people who listen to jazz in complex professions that require increased concentration: surgeons, directors of large corporations and enterprises, scientists. In conclusion, I would like to note that jazz music in general has a positive effect on many factors of the human psyche and culture of thinking, but with artistic point From our point of view, this direction inspires the majority of listeners to strive to expand their preferences, which also leads to the development of good taste.

Brain "under jazz"

Brain "under jazz"

When jazz musicians improvise, areas of their brains that control self-censorship and neural inhibition are turned off, and areas that allow for self-expression are turned on instead.

A related study from Johns Hopkins University, involving volunteer musicians from the Peabody Institute and using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), shed light on the creative improvisation that artists use in everyday life.

Jazz musicians, when improvising, create their own unique riffs by turning off inhibitions and turning on creativity.

Scientists from the University of Medicine and the National Institute on Deafness say they are interested in the possible neurological basis of the trance-like state that jazz musicians enter when they begin spontaneous improvisations.

“When jazz musicians improvise, they often play with eyes closed in his characteristic style, demonstrating the traditional rules of melody and rhythm,” says Charles J. Limb, professor of medicine and assistant professor in the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, who is also an accomplished jazz saxophonist.

“This is a special mood of the soul,” he adds, “when suddenly, suddenly, a musician creates music that he has never heard, never thought about, or played anything like that before. What comes out is completely spontaneous.”

Many studies recent years have concentrated on trying to understand which parts of the human brain are activated when listening to music, and, as Limb argues, too little attention has been paid to studying brain activity during spontaneous music composition.

Wanting to understand what was happening to his own brain while “jazzed,” he and his colleague Allen R. Braun, a professor of medicine, developed a plan to monitor brain function during musical improvisation in real time.

They recruited six experienced jazz pianists to participate in this study, three of them from the Peabody Institute, a music conservatory where Limb holds a part-time professorship. Other volunteers became aware of the study through word of mouth in the local jazz community.

The researchers developed a special keyboard that pianists could play inside a functional magnetic resonance imaging machine; a brain scanner that highlights areas of the brain that respond to various stimuli, such as identifying which areas are active when a person is engaged in some kind of mental activity.

Because the functional magnetic resonance imaging machine uses powerful magnets, the scientists developed a custom keyboard that contains no metal parts that could be attracted by the magnet. They also used headphones compatible with the unit, which allowed the musicians to hear the music they were creating as they played.

Each musician participated in four different exercises designed to differentiate brain activity while playing from memory of simple piano pieces and brain activity observed during improvisation.

Inside the fMRI machine with the keyboard perched on their laps, all pianists began playing the C major scale, a well-memorized series of notes that every aspiring musician learns. The metronome built into the headphones was intended to ensure that all musicians played the same scale - in the same order, at the same time intervals.

For the second exercise, the pianists had to improvise. They had to play the quarter notes of the scale, but they could play them in any order they wanted.

Next, the musicians had to play the original blues tune, which they had learned in advance, while a jazz quartet played in the background, complementing the melody. In the final exercise, the musicians had to improvise their own melodies using the same jazz quartet recording.

Limb and Brown then analyzed recordings taken from the brain by the scanner. Because the areas of the brain activated by playing from memory are the same parts of the brain that are typically active during any kind of piano playing, the researchers excluded them from the brain picture obtained during improvisation.

Working further only on areas of the brain specific to the process of improvisation, the scientists saw strikingly similar patterns, regardless of whether the musicians were performing a simple improvisation on the C major scale, or playing a more complex melody while improvising like a jazz quartet.

The scientists found that a part of the brain known as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex—a broad frontal region of the brain that extends from the center to the periphery—showed a slowdown in brain activity during improvisation. This area appears to be responsible for planned actions and self-censorship, such as carefully choosing words in interviews.

Disabling this area could result in decreased inhibition, Limb concludes. The scientists also found increased activity in the medial prefrontal cortex, i.e. in the center of the frontal part of the brain. This area is responsible for self-expression, activities that express individuality, such as telling a sincere story about yourself.

“Jazz is often described as an extremely individualistic art form. You can easily identify the game jazz musician, because Every jazz musician's improvisation sounds like his own music,” says Limb. “As we now imagine, when you ‘tell’ your own musical history, what happens is that you shut down impulses that can suppress the flow of creative thought.”

Limb notes that this type of brain activity may occur during other types of improvisation that are an integral part of the lives of both artists and artists. ordinary people. For example, he notes, people constantly improvise their choice of words in conversation, just as they improvise with solutions to unexpected problems. “Without this type of creativity, humans would not have been able to develop as a species. It's an integral part of who we are,” says Limb.