Listening to music is something that everyone does in daily life, but did you know that the music you listen to on the bus could actually provide a host of health benefits for you! For a long time, the healing properties have been known and it has been used as a tool to aid recovery and prevent stress. New research only confirms those notions and now music can be used in scientific ways to improve the performance of people and help them through stressful situations. here are 10 health benefits of music you should be aware of,
Health Benefits of Music
1. Ease Pain
Music has been known for its curative and positive effects, but concrete research has also suggested that music can help ease the pain of patients by reducing the intensity with which they perceive pain. The health benefits of music are most apparent in the fields of geriatric care (care of old patients), intensive care, or palliative medicine (an area of healthcare that focuses on preventing and relieving the suffering of patients in chronic pain).
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2. Increase workout endurance
Ever wondered why your gym is constantly playing music while people work out? One of the important reasons is that music can improve your endurance during the workout and help you achieve the goal you have set for yourself without burning yourself out. This effect may also be in part due to the ability of music to take your mind off the workout and make you focus on your favorite song instead.
3. Speed up post workout recovery
Recent research has shown that listening to music after a grueling workout helps the body recover faster and also makes the person feel less tired after the workout. This is one of the major health benefits of music and this technique is regularly practiced by athletes and sportspersons who have to undergo rigors training schedules. While slow music is the most beneficial for recovery, any kind of music has a positive effect on the body.
4. Improves sleep quality
Insomnia and irregular sleep patterns is a very common problem especially among teenagers and young working professionals. Classical music is known to help people with regularizing sleep patterns and to fall asleep. Research on college students suffering from insomnia showed that classical music can be used as a treatment regimen instead of using sleeping pills that are expensive and may also cause side effects.
5. Helps people eat less
An indirect effect of music is that it can be used to affect the speed of eating since people tend to eat along with the rhythm of the music. In a setting with dim lights and soft music, people tend to eat less since they eat slowly along with the music. This helps to control the diet and eating habits of people without too much effort. Slow eating also makes the person more aware of the cues that suggest fullness and they can stop eating as soon as they are full, thus avoiding overeating.
6. Enhance blood vessel function
Research has shown that regulating blood supply is one of the major benefits of music since the emotions patients feel while listening to music can help improve the circulation of blood and improves blood vessel function. Since the emotion of happiness releases hormones that increase blood supply and circulation, the positive feelings one experiences after listening to music contribute to the better function. This healthy flow can help prevent many vascular diseases and also reduces the risk of cardiovascular conditions.
7. Reduces stress
The most well-known benefit of music is that it can relieve stress and helps with lifting the mood. Almost all types of music trigger hormones that induce the feeling of happiness and this reduces stress. It also mitigates stress since slow music can alter brainwave patterns and induce states similar to meditation, thus calming down the person. This effect is known to help in reducing the symptoms of a migraine, pre menstrual syndrome and also behavioral issues.
8. Relieves symptoms of depression
Like the effects that reduce stress, music can also reduce the symptoms of depression and can prevent people from slipping into bouts of depression. However, not all type of music has the same effect. Classical and meditative sounds seem to be particularly uplifting, whereas heavy metal and techno can actually make depressive symptoms worse. The speed, tone, and notes of the music determine the effect it will have on the body.
9. Improves cognitive performance
Slow and non-distracting music has been proven to increase performance on cognitive tasks like solving tests and answering questions related to reasoning. Previous studies suggest that the appropriate music can help improve cognitive function in almost all cases while more recent studies suggest that the effect of the music depends on how successfully it can list the mood of the person. This has linked the mood of the person to cognitive function and music acts as the tool to do that.
10. Helps reduce anxiety before and after surgery
Music is one of the best ways to reduce stress and anxiety and one study found that listening to music helped put cardiovascular surgery patients at ease as they awaited their operations since it relaxed the patient and elevated mood. Since the number of people getting the cardiovascular surgery done is on the rise, this information can be used by hospitals to make the patient’s experience more pleasant. Another study on patients who have undergone open heart surgery has also suggested that those patients who listened to music while resting in bed had a faster and easier recovery.
Most research on the health benefits of music has shown that the kind of music you listen can vary the effects it has on your body. Slow and classical music usually has a soothing effect and can act as a stress buster while heavy music may push people further into depression.
