POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY: This soothing advice will really be music to your ears

IN this column we regularly discuss the science of self compassion.

As our readers will know, self compassion is being able to empathise with our own suffering but also at the same time doing what we can to alleviate that suffering.

Researchers in this field – Paul Gilbert, Chris Germer, Kristin Neff for example - have studied how we can be self compassionate and how this can make us feel “soothed” psychologically.

How we talk to ourselves, how we reason, what we pay attention to, how we behave, the pictures we create in our minds – all of these things influence whether we feel calm and soothed or threatened and anxious.

We often explore in therapy with our clients how they can soothe themselves using compassionate behaviour. Often, we suggest doing activities they enjoy and can immerse themselves in and practise in a mindful, meditative way.

Music is one such activity that clients often nominate as something they can do to stimulate soothing emotions and balance threat and drive emotions in their lives. Whether you can play piano, the violin, the cello or guitar to a high level or whether you just love listening to music it does not matter.

Either can shift you out of a negative mood and help motivate you. Think of all the gym-goers pounding sweatily away on treadmills while plugged into their music.

From a neurological perspective, music seems to be rooted in the primitive brain structures that are involved in motivation, reward and emotion.

Music is processed first through the cerebellum and amygdala (the “old brain”) rather than the frontal lobes (the “new brain”).

Research shows that music can have a beneficial effect on brain chemicals such as dopamine, which is linked to feelings of pleasure, and oxytocin, the so-called “love hormone.” And there is moderate evidence that music can help lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

Music has the ability to evoke images and feelings. Neuroscientific research tells us that the language, emotion and memory centres are all connected as we process music.

Music gets preserved at those neural pathways that connect music with positive feelings. That is why if you associate a particular song with a particular memory, for example the song you danced to at your wedding, you may (hopefully) have good memories and feelings evoked when you hear the song in the future.

The extent of this connection apparently differs amongst people; this might explain why one individual’s connection to one type of song or music and another’s connection can be completely different.

Music therapy is a distinct and expanding profession which is increasingly accessible in a variety of health care settings. Writing recently in The Irish Psychologist, Bill Ahessy, a senior music therapist and researcher, highlights a body of research that support the effectiveness of music therapy in working with autism spectrum disorders, depression, schizophrenia, acquired brain injury and dementia.

Apparently we are hardwired for music from birth and born with an innate capacity for musicality regardless of our cognitive functioning.

Music is rewarding in itself, but also from a neurological perspective, it engages neural networks that are shared with other non-musical functions such as cognitive, memory, emotional, language and motor functions, resulting in changes to brain structures.

For example, because of speech and music’s similarities, melodic intonation therapy is a technique which has been applied to address language disorders in clinical practice.

Ahessy, in the same article, describes how music therapy can help people with dementia and other age-related disorders by improving their mood, memory and communication and social interaction skills.

Apparently music abilities are often spared in dementia and music can continue to be enjoyed even as the disease progresses. In a randomised controlled trial conducted by Ahessy in 2016, music therapy was associated with reduced depressive symptoms, increased cognitive functioning and better quality of life in patients with and without dementia.

Researchers from the MARCS institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, (an international group of neuroscientists, psychologists and musicians) have found that music improves memory, retention and learning.

In addition, music can elevate our mood. Fast, up-tempo music can boost our motivation and energise us, classical and ambient music apparently have the best mood-boosting benefits, while heavy metal and hard electronic music were considered by researchers to have the opposite effect! So, when we are stressed we should choose music that is calm and quiet as opposed to heavy metal or hard rock.

Music promotes relaxation not just in the mind but in the muscles, so if our bodies are less tense our minds - as a result of listening to easy, calming music - will feel less tense.

Maybe this is why many people find that music helps them drift off to sleep at night and why many students claim that having music playing in the background helps them study.

Parents take note.

Julie O’Flaherty and Imelda Ferguson are chartered clinical psychologists, both based in private practice in Tullamore. Through Mind Your Self Midlands, they run courses on Positive Psychology and Mindfulness through the year. They can be contacted through the Psychological Society of Ireland www.psychologicalsociety.ie (Find a Psychologist section) or on their Facebook page, Mind Your Self Midlands.