Coping with stress: the effectiveness of different types of music.

Full Abstract

Listening to classical and self-selected relaxing music after exposure to a stressor should result in significant reductions in anxiety, anger, and sympathetic nervous system arousal, and increased relaxation compared to those who sit in silence or listen to heavy metal music. Fifty-six college students, 15 males and 41 females, were exposed to different types of music genres after experiencing a stressful test. Several 4 x 2 mixed design analyses of variance were conducted to determine the effects of music and silence conditions (heavy metal, classical, or self-selected music and silence) and time (pre-post music) on emotional state and physiological arousal. Results indicate listening to self-select or classical music, after exposure to a stressor, significantly reduces negative emotional states and physiological arousal compared to listening to heavy metal music or sitting in silence.

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Author information

Author/s: Labbé, Elise (E); Schmidt, Nicholas (N); Babin, Jonathan (J); Pharr, Martha (M);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of South Alabama, Mobile, AL 36688, USA. elabbe@usouthal.edu

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Randomized Controlled Trial; Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

Journal: Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback (Appl Psychophysiol Biofeedback), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2007-Dec; vol 32 (issue 3-4) : pp 163-8

Dates: Created 2007/11/13; Completed 2008/01/31;

PMID: 17965934, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 11/6/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Male
Music - psychology
Music Therapy - methods
Relaxation - physiology
Stress, Psychological - therapy

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