How—and when—emotional responses to music influence memory

Listening to music while doing something can make that activity more enjoyable. But listening to music after an experience or activity can make it more memorable if you have the optimal emotional response while listening to it, according to new research by UCLA neuroscientists published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

“We found that whether music was negative or positive or whether it was familiar didn’t have as much of an influence on memory as the emotional response people felt while listening to it,” said corresponding author and UCLA integrative biology and physiology professor Stephanie Leal. “There was an optimal level of emotional response that aided in remembering the details of an experience. Too much or too little emotional response had the opposite effect—worse memory for details, but better memory for the gist of an experience.”

Scientists have been trying to tease apart the close association between music, emotions, and memory to find ways to improve learning and problems involving memory such as Alzheimer’s disease and PTSD. Music could become a powerful, noninvasive and even pleasant therapeutic tool.

The new study involved volunteers who viewed a series of ordinary household objects, such as telephones, laptops, and oranges. After viewing about 100 images, the volunteers listened to classical music for 10 minutes. After their levels of emotional arousal had dropped back down to baseline, they completed tests of their memory for the objects they had seen.

They were shown pictures that were either identical to the images they had seen, ones that were very similar but slightly different, and ones they hadn’t seen at all. Participants had to identify if the images were exactly the same, or new or different in any way. They also answered questions about their familiarity with the music, and how they felt while listening to it.

Overall, music did not improve participants’ memory of the objects. But some individuals showed significant improvement—especially for recognizing that an object wasn’t quite the same during the memory test, but similar. All participants completed a standard questionnaire used by psychologists to measure emotional response.

Further analysis showed that the individuals with improved memory had experienced a moderate level of emotional arousal, so not too much or too little, whether listening to classical music that sounded uplifting or gloomy, or familiar or unfamiliar. Those who felt strong emotions in either direction, in fact, tended to have the most blurry recall of the objects and remembered the gist of the images better.

Memory is often a balance between remembering the gist versus the details. Gist-based memory lets us forget some of the details while remembering the big picture of the information or experience. This is important because we can’t and don’t need to hang on to every detail of everything we encounter. But it’s also important to be able to remember some specific details, and for that we have detail-based memory.

“We used a task designed to tap into the difference between gist- and detail-based memory,” Leal said. “Music helped with detail-based memory but only when the level of emotional arousal was just right for that person.”

The findings suggest that listening to music immediately after an experience can alter what we remember. For example, listening to moderately arousing music after studying might help you remember the detailed information you need for a test the next day. However, listening to music that provokes very strong emotional arousal immediately after studying might have the opposite effect.

The key is finding that optimal level of emotional arousal from music after a learning task can enhance memory as well as what information you want to remember, like the gist or the details.

“Music has the ability to influence a part of your brain called the hippocampus, which is essential for turning experiences into memories,” Leal said. “We think it should be possible to tap into that in a selective way to boost or impair memory depending on the therapeutic goals.”

For example, using music to boost memory for the details of an experience could help people keep their minds sharp as they age, and help improve memory for people in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. In conditions like anxiety and PTSD, using music that boosts gist-based memory to smooth out experiences that trigger a trauma response could help people cope.

Because the optimal response varied highly between individuals, further research will help Leal’s lab learn how their approach can be tailored for personalized therapies.

“In my lab, we’re trying to detect changes in the brain and cognition early. Music is noninvasive, low cost, and easy to personalize, and by learning more about the mechanisms that connect it to memory, we can develop treatments and interventions to prevent the disease from progressing,” Leal said.

“If the federal government reduces funding for Alzheimer’s research, the chances that we’ll be able to develop this line of research into inexpensive yet effective treatments are very low, as developing personalized treatments requires lots of participants in research to really capture individual needs.”

Listening to music while doing something can make that activity more enjoyable. But listening to music after an experience or activity can make it more memorable if you have the optimal emotional response while listening to it, according to new research by UCLA neuroscientists published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

“We found that whether music was negative or positive or whether it was familiar didn’t have as much of an influence on memory as the emotional response people felt while listening to it,” said corresponding author and UCLA integrative biology and physiology professor Stephanie Leal. “There was an optimal level of emotional response that aided in remembering the details of an experience. Too much or too little emotional response had the opposite effect—worse memory for details, but better memory for the gist of an experience.”

Scientists have been trying to tease apart the close association between music, emotions, and memory to find ways to improve learning and problems involving memory such as Alzheimer’s disease and PTSD. Music could become a powerful, noninvasive and even pleasant therapeutic tool.

The new study involved volunteers who viewed a series of ordinary household objects, such as telephones, laptops, and oranges. After viewing about 100 images, the volunteers listened to classical music for 10 minutes. After their levels of emotional arousal had dropped back down to baseline, they completed tests of their memory for the objects they had seen.

They were shown pictures that were either identical to the images they had seen, ones that were very similar but slightly different, and ones they hadn’t seen at all. Participants had to identify if the images were exactly the same, or new or different in any way. They also answered questions about their familiarity with the music, and how they felt while listening to it.

Overall, music did not improve participants’ memory of the objects. But some individuals showed significant improvement—especially for recognizing that an object wasn’t quite the same during the memory test, but similar. All participants completed a standard questionnaire used by psychologists to measure emotional response.

Further analysis showed that the individuals with improved memory had experienced a moderate level of emotional arousal, so not too much or too little, whether listening to classical music that sounded uplifting or gloomy, or familiar or unfamiliar. Those who felt strong emotions in either direction, in fact, tended to have the most blurry recall of the objects and remembered the gist of the images better.

Memory is often a balance between remembering the gist versus the details. Gist-based memory lets us forget some of the details while remembering the big picture of the information or experience. This is important because we can’t and don’t need to hang on to every detail of everything we encounter. But it’s also important to be able to remember some specific details, and for that we have detail-based memory.

“We used a task designed to tap into the difference between gist- and detail-based memory,” Leal said. “Music helped with detail-based memory but only when the level of emotional arousal was just right for that person.”

The findings suggest that listening to music immediately after an experience can alter what we remember. For example, listening to moderately arousing music after studying might help you remember the detailed information you need for a test the next day. However, listening to music that provokes very strong emotional arousal immediately after studying might have the opposite effect.

The key is finding that optimal level of emotional arousal from music after a learning task can enhance memory as well as what information you want to remember, like the gist or the details.

“Music has the ability to influence a part of your brain called the hippocampus, which is essential for turning experiences into memories,” Leal said. “We think it should be possible to tap into that in a selective way to boost or impair memory depending on the therapeutic goals.”

For example, using music to boost memory for the details of an experience could help people keep their minds sharp as they age, and help improve memory for people in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. In conditions like anxiety and PTSD, using music that boosts gist-based memory to smooth out experiences that trigger a trauma response could help people cope.

Because the optimal response varied highly between individuals, further research will help Leal’s lab learn how their approach can be tailored for personalized therapies.

“In my lab, we’re trying to detect changes in the brain and cognition early. Music is noninvasive, low cost, and easy to personalize, and by learning more about the mechanisms that connect it to memory, we can develop treatments and interventions to prevent the disease from progressing,” Leal said.

“If the federal government reduces funding for Alzheimer’s research, the chances that we’ll be able to develop this line of research into inexpensive yet effective treatments are very low, as developing personalized treatments requires lots of participants in research to really capture individual needs.”