The Mozart effect can refer to:
Because of bad methodology in the first experiment and lack of replication, the Mozart effect is now believed to be a myth.
- A set of research results indicating that listening to Mozart's music may induce a short-term improvement on the performance of certain kinds of mental tasks known as "spatial-temporal reasoning";
- Popularized versions of the hypothesis, which suggest that "listening to Mozart makes you smarter", or that early childhood exposure to classical music has a beneficial effect on mental development;
- A US trademark for a set of commercial recordings and related materials, which are claimed to harness the effect for a variety of purposes. The trademark owner, Don Campbell, Inc., claims benefits far beyond improving spatio-temporal reasoning or raising intelligence, defining the mark as "an inclusive term signifying the transformational powers of music in health, education, and well-being."
Because of bad methodology in the first experiment and lack of replication, the Mozart effect is now believed to be a myth.
Alfred A. Tomatis
The concept of the "Mozart effect" was described by French researcher Dr. Alfred A. Tomatis in his 1991 book Pourquoi Mozart? (Why Mozart?).
He used the music of Mozart in his efforts to "retrain" the ear, and
believed that listening to the music presented at differing frequencies
helped the ear, and promoted healing and the development of the brain.
Rauscher et al. 1993 study
Frances Rauscher, Gordon Shaw, and Catherine Ky (1993) investigated the effect of listening to music by Mozart on spatial reasoning, and the results were published in Nature.
They gave research participants one of three standard tests of abstract
spatial reasoning after they had experienced each of three listening
conditions: the Sonata for Two Pianos in D major, K. 448
by Mozart, verbal relaxation instructions, and silence. They found a
temporary enhancement of spatial-reasoning, as measured by
spatial-reasoning sub tasks of the Stanford-Binet IQ test. Rauscher et
al. show that the enhancing effect of the music condition is only
temporary: no student had effects extending beyond the 15-minute period
in which they were tested. The study makes no statement of an increase
in IQ in general (because IQ was never measured).
Popularization
While
Rauscher et al. only showed an increase in "spatial intelligence", the
results were popularly interpreted as an increase in general IQ. This
misconception, and the fact that the music used in the study was by
Mozart, had an obvious appeal to those who valued this music; the Mozart
effect was thus widely reported. In 1994, New York Times music columnist Alex Ross
wrote in a light-hearted article, "researchers [Rauscher and Shaw] have
determined that listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter", and
presented this as the final piece of evidence that Mozart has dethroned Beethoven as "the world's greatest composer. " A 1997 Boston Globe
article mentioned some of the Rauscher and Shaw results. It described
one study in which three- and four-year-olds who were given eight months
of private piano lessons scored 30% higher on tests of spatio-temporal
reasoning than control groups given computer lessons, singing lessons,
and no training.
The 1997 book by Don Campbell, The Mozart Effect: Tapping the Power of Music to Heal the Body, Strengthen the Mind, and Unlock the Creative Spirit, discusses the theory that listening to Mozart (especially the piano concertos) may temporarily increase one's IQ
and produce many other beneficial effects on mental function. Campbell
recommends playing specially selected classical music to infants, in the
expectation that it will benefit their mental development.
After The Mozart Effect, Campbell wrote a follow-up book, The Mozart Effect For Children,
and created related products. Among these are collections of music that
he states harness the Mozart effect to enhance "deep rest and
rejuvenation", "intelligence and learning", and "creativity and
imagination". Campbell defines the term as "an inclusive term signifying
the transformational powers of music in health, education, and
well-being. It represents the general use of music to reduce stress,
depression, or anxiety; induce relaxation or sleep; activate the body;
and improve memory or awareness. Innovative and experimental uses of music and sound can improve listening disorders, dyslexia, attention deficit disorder, autism, and other mental and physical disorders and diseases".
These theories are controversial. The relationship of sound and
music (both played and listened to) for cognitive function and various
physiological metrics has been explored in studies with no definitive
results.
Political impact
The political impact of the theory was demonstrated on January 13, 1998, when Zell Miller, governor of Georgia,
announced that his proposed state budget would include $105,000 a year
to provide every child born in Georgia with a tape or CD of classical
music. Miller stated "No one questions that listening to music at a very
early age affects the spatial-temporal reasoning that underlies math
and engineering and even chess." Miller played legislators some of
Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" on a tape recorder and asked "Now, don't you feel smarter already?" Miller asked Yoel Levi, music director of the Atlanta Symphony, to compile a collection of classical pieces that should be included. State representative Homer DeLoach said "I asked about the possibility of including some Charlie Daniels
or something like that, but they said they thought the classical music
has a greater positive impact. Having never studied those impacts too
much, I guess I'll just have to take their word for that."
Subsequent research and meta-analyses
While some supportive reports have been published,
studies with positive results have tended to be associated with any
form of music that has energetic and positive emotional qualities.
Moreover, the intellectual benefits of enhanced mood and arousal are
not restricted to spatial-temporal reasoning, but extend to speed of
processing and creative problem solving. Among children, some studies suggest no effect on IQ or spatial ability, whereas others suggest that the effect can be elicited with energetic popular music that the children enjoy.
The weight of subsequent evidence supports either a null effect, or
short-term effects related to increases in mood and arousal, with mixed
results published after the initial report in Nature.
In 1999 a major challenge was raised to the existence of the Mozart effect by two teams of researchers. In a pair of papers published together under the title "Prelude or Requiem for the 'Mozart Effect'?" Chabris reported a meta-analysis
demonstrating that "any cognitive enhancement is small and does not
reflect any change in IQ or reasoning ability in general, but instead
derives entirely from performance on one specific type of cognitive task
and has a simple neuropsychological explanation", called "enjoyment
arousal". For example, he cites a study that found that "listening
either to Mozart or to a passage from a Stephen King
story enhanced subjects' performance in paper folding and cutting (one
of the tests frequently employed by Rauscher and Shaw) but only for
those who enjoyed what they heard". Steele et. al. found that "listening
to Mozart produced a 3-point increase relative to silence in one
experiment and a 4-point decrease in the other experiment".
In another study, the effect was replicated with the original Mozart
music, but eliminated when the tempo was slowed down and major chords
were replaced by minor chords.
Another meta-analysis by Pietschnig, Voracek, and Formann (2010)
combined results of 39 studies to answer the question as to whether or
not the Mozart Effect exists. They concluded that there is little
evidence to support the Mozart effect, as shown by small effect sizes.
However, the most striking finding in this meta-analysis is the
significantly larger effects published in studies affiliated with
Rauscher or Rideout, with effect sizes more than three times higher for
published studies affiliated with these founding members of the Mozart
Effect. These systematic moderating effects due to lab affiliation call
into question the existence of a Mozart Effect. In addition, this study
also found strong evidence supporting a confounding publication bias when effect sizes of samples who listened to Mozart are compared to samples not exposed to a stimulus.
Despite implementing Rauscher, Shaw, and Ky's (1995)
suggestions of three key components that must be present to replicate
the Mozart Effect, McCutcheon (2000) still failed to reproduce the
Mozart Effect in a study with 36 adults. These conditions were: to
ensure a task that taps into spatial components of mental imagery; a
research design that does not include a pretest to avoid ceiling
effects; a musical composition that is complex rather than repetitive
and simple. Regardless of listening to classical music, jazz or silence,
the study did not yield a significant effect on spatial reasoning
performance.
The Mozart Effect is likely just an artifact of arousal and heightened mood.
Arousal is the confounding variable that mediates the relationship
between spatial ability and music that defines the Mozart Effect.
The "neural resonance" theory of Rauscher and colleagues which contends
that Mozart's music primes the neural pathways of spatial reasoning has
been widely criticized.
Government bodies also became involved in analysing the wealth
(some 300+ articles as of 2005) of reports. A German report concluded,
for instance, that "... passively listening to Mozart — or indeed any
other music you enjoy — does not make you smarter. But more studies
should be done to find out whether music lessons could raise your
child's IQ in the long term".
Popular presentations of the "Mozart effect", including Alex
Ross's comment that "listening to Mozart actually makes you smarter" and
Zell Miller's "don't you feel smarter" query to the Georgia
legislature, almost always tie it to "intelligence." Rauscher, one of
the original researchers, has disclaimed this idea. In a 1999 reply to
an article challenging the effect, published along with the article, she wrote (emphasis added):
Our results on the effects of listening to Mozart's Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major K. 448 on spatial–temporal task performance have generated much interest but several misconceptions, many of which are reflected in attempts to replicate the research. The comments by Chabris and Steele et al. echo the most common of these: that listening to Mozart enhances intelligence. We made no such claim. The effect is limited to spatial–temporal tasks involving mental imagery and temporal ordering.
On efforts like Miller's budget proposal, and the press attention
surrounding the effect, Rauscher has said, "I don't think it can hurt.
I'm all for exposing children to wonderful cultural experiences. But I
do think the money could be better spent on music education programs."
Many scholars in the psychological community now view the claim
that playing classical music to children can boost their intelligence to
be a "myth." Emory University psychologist Scott Lilienfeld ranks Mozart Effect as number six in his book 50 Great Myths of Popular Psychology.
Health benefits
Music has been evaluated to see if it has other properties. The April 2001 edition of Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine assessed the possible health benefits of the music of Mozart.
John Jenkins played Sonata K.448 to patients with epilepsy and found a
decrease in epileptiform activity. According to the British Epilepsy
Organization, research has suggested that apart from Mozart's K.448 and Piano Concerto No. 23 (K. 488), only one other piece of music has been found to have a similar effect; a song by the Greek composer Yanni, entitled "Acroyali/Standing in Motion" (version from Yanni Live at the Acropolis performed at the Acropolis). It was determined to have the "Mozart effect", by the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine because it was similar to Mozart's K.448 in tempo, structure, melodic and harmonic consonance and predictability.
Other uses of Mozart's music
While
it is clear that exposure to Mozart does not raise IQ, studies of the
effects of music have explored as diverse areas as its links to seizure onset or research in animals suggesting that even exposure in-utero in rats improves their maze learning. The original claim continues to influence public life. For instance a German sewage treatment plant plays Mozart music to break down the waste faster, reports the UK Guardian. Anton Stucki, chief operator of the Treuenbrietzen
plant was quoted as saying, "We think the secret is in the vibrations
of the music, which penetrate everything—including the water, the sewage
and the cells."
