Music and Studies: do they go hand in hand?
For a multitude of people, including myself, music has proven to be a helpful tool and also medicine at times, and they want to tune in to it 24*7. While for others it is impossible to concentrate with any kind of background sound.
For your brief, music has a lot of benefits attached to it:
- improves mood
- management of pain and fatigue
- increases motivation
- improves memory and brain stimulation
Looking at these benefits of music, you might be wondering that music should also improve your study sessions just as it increases your power while you work out.
To give you the right answer to this is a bit hard, as music does not affect everybody in the same way. As a result, this question cannot be answered simply with a yes or no, but is more complicated than you might think.
How Music Helps
Certainly, it is true and proven that some types of music improve your concentration and memory. However, music does not help in a direct manner but instead uses an indirect approach.
- Motivates you
If you have ever stayed up a whole night writing an assignment, you might have accidentally banged your head against the table because of your drowsiness. And sometimes, you would have promised yourself your favourite treat or the latest episode of the anime you like to watch after finishing your work to motivate you to complete your writing faster. Music also works in the same manner.
Various research has proven that music also stimulates your brain into thinking of music as a reward for itself, similarly to your favourite takeout meal or an episode of your liking. Moreover, you will not have to wait till the end; songs will directly help with assignments while you are writing them.
- Increases Concentration
Our brain processes a lot of information each day and stores it by segregating it into smaller parts. Numerous researches have proven that music trains our brain to pay more attention to minute details of an event and also help in predicting, what might happen next.
You may be wondering how this will help you in your studies. Well, if you are one of those students who cannot take large chunks of new information in one go, listening to music will ease this process for you. Moreover, the prediction part that was mentioned before can be linked to improving your reasoning skills.
- Improves Mood
Music not only increases your concentration and motivation, it also aids in lowering your stress level and improving your mindset. Several researchers suggest that a good mindset also improves your information-gathering capacity.
And as studying can be stressful for your mind, especially when there is a new subject on the line, music will make you feel a bit relaxed and work more efficiently.
How Music Can Harm
Not everyone is intrigued by music, it can sometimes also hinder in your working.
- Negative Impact on Working Memory
Music can also be an obstacle in the learning, problem-solving and other study related tasks.
Working memory applies when you trying to remember:
- Items on a list
- Step-by-step process for solving a math problem
- Sequence of events
As discussed earlier, our brain works with a few pieces of information at a time. A good working memory implies that you can handle more material at a given time.
Research also shows evidence that listening to music can lower your working memory capacity
If you already have a hard time manipulating multiple pieces of information, listening to music could make this process even more difficult.
- Can Distract You
While listening to music, at some point, you may have also started to sing the lyrics unknowingly. When you are in a situation where you feel sad or depressed, music can prove to be a great getaway.
However, while studying, you would not like to go anywhere away from it. If you’re writing a term paper or attempting to solve a tough calculus equation, music that is overly loud or quick may disrupt your ideas and slow down your work-flow.
This concludes the benefits and disadvantages of incorporating music into your study sessions. And it can be seen that listening to music does not always make you less productive.
- Best Music for Studies
If you prefer to study with music, there is no need to change your style. Here are some tips for selecting music that can enhance your study time.
Listening to music while you study or work doesn’t always make you less productive or efficient.
If you prefer to study with music, there’s no need to give it up. Keeping these tips in mind can help you find the most helpful music for work and study:
- Avoid music with lyrics
- Choose instrumental music
- Avoid surprising or adventurous music
- Keep the volume low
- Stream ad free music
- Listen to nature sounds or white noises
Music has shown to improve mood and motivate people all around the globe, people from all culture use some kind of music in their day to day life. However, it may not work as a brilliant study tool. Even people who love music, stray away from it while studying.
Selecting music carefully for study can help you maximize your results, and if you struggle to focus, white noise is always there to help you.
Authors’ bio :
Dr.Leonard Prado is an artist and has been in this field for a long time. He is fond of creating abstract art and is really into listening to ambient music. He has been working with Global Assignment Help as an expert writer to assist students with having more free time to enjoy their listening to music and has been offering help with assignment writing for more than 3 years. In his spare time, he goes out for a walk, records music, and writes poems.