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Psychology of music preference

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Main page The psychology of music preference refers as the psychological factors behind peoples' different music preferences.
Contents Music is heard by people daily in many parts of the world, and affects people in various ways from emotion regulation
Featured content to cognitive development, along with providing a means for self-expression. Music training has been shown to help
Current events improve intellectual development and ability, though no connection has been found as to how it affects emotion
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regulation.[1] Numerous studies have been conducted to show that individual personality can have an effect on music
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preference, mostly using personality, though a recent meta-analysis has shown that personality in itself explains little
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variance in music preferences.[2] These studies are not limited to Western or American culture, as they have been
Interaction conducted with significant results in countries all over the world, including Japan,[3] Germany,[4] and Spain.[5]
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Community portal 1 Personality and music preference
Recent changes 1.1 Personality
Contact page 1.1.1 Openness to experience
1.1.2 Conscientiousness
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1.1.3 Extraversion
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1.1.4 Agreeableness
Related changes
1.1.5 Neurotism
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2 Individual and situational influences on musical preferences
Special pages
2.1 Gender
Permanent link
Page information 2.2 Age
Wikidata item 2.3 Season of the year
Cite this page 2.4 Familiarity
2.5 Self views
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2.6 Mood
Create a book 3 See also
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4 References
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Personality and music preference [edit]

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Personality [edit]
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Various questionnaires have been created to both measure the big five personality traits and musical preferences. The
majority of studies attempting to find the correlation between personality and musical preferences administered
questionnaires to measure both traits.[6][7][8][9][10][11][12] Others used questionnaires to determine personality traits, and
then asked participants to rate musical excerpts on scales such as liking, perceived complexity, emotions felt, and
more.[13][14][15][16]

In general, the plasticity traits (openness to experience and extraversion) affect music preference more than the stability
traits (agreeableness, neuroticism, and conscientiousness),[17] but each trait is still worth discussing. The personality
traits have also been shown to correlate significantly with the emotional effect music has on people. Individual
personality differences can help predict the emotional intensity and valence derived from music.[18]

Openness to experience [edit]

Of all the traits, openness to experience has been shown to have the greatest effect upon genre preference. [13][6][19] In
general, those rated high in openness to experience prefer more music categorized as complex and novel like classical,
jazz, and eclecticism,[20] and intense and rebellious music.[21][11][6][22] In the study, reflective and complex genres
included classical, blues, jazz, and folk music, while intense and rebellious genres included rock, alternative, and heavy
metal music. [11] One of the facets of openness to experience is aesthetic appreciation, which is why researchers
generally explain the high positive correlation between openness and liking complex music.[23] People rating higher in
openness also tend to rate higher in self-assessed intelligence. This suggests that high openness leads to higher self-
perceived intelligence, which could also explain why this group tends to like more complex, classical music and jazz.[24]

One study looking at how personality traits affect music-induced emotion found that of all the traits, openness to
experience was the best predictor of higher emotionally intense reactions to sad and slow music. The most common
feelings described from sad music were nostalgia, peacefulness, and wonder, and openness to experience correlated
positively with all these feelings.[25] Sad music has also been theorized to allow for greater experience of aesthetic
experiences and beauty.[16] Furthermore, open individuals show a preference for diverse musical styles, but do not
prefer popular forms of contemporary music, indicating that there are limits to this openness. [26] However, this is only
true up to a certain point, as another study looked at music's ability to produce "chills" in the listeners. Although this
study found that openness was the best predictor of genre preference, there is no way to use openness to experience
to predict who gets chills from music. Instead, the only measure for that was frequency of listening to music and the
self-rated value of the importance of music in one's life.[27]

Another study examined how openness to experience and frequency of listening are related and how they affect music
preference. While listening to classical music excerpts, those rated high in openness tended to decrease in liking music
faster during repeated listenings, as opposed to those scoring low in openness, who tended to like music more with
repeated plays. This suggests novelty in music is an important quality for people high in openness to experience.[28]

One study had people take a personality test before and after listening to classical music with and without written lyrics
in front of them. Both the music with and without lyrics showed some effect at actually changing people's self-rated
personality traits, most significantly in terms of openness to experience, which showed some significant increase.[29]
Instead of personality affecting music preference, here classical music altered the assessment of their own
personalities and make people assess themselves as more open.

Openness to experience is also positively correlated with intellectual or cognitive use of music, which means that this
individual enjoys analyzing complex musical compositions.[8][9][12][30] Furthermore, individuals more open prefer a
greater number of melodic themes in a work of music.[31][10]

Conscientiousness [edit]

Conscientiousness is negatively correlated with intense and rebellious music, such as rock and heavy metal music.[11]
While previous studies have found a relationship between conscientiousness and emotional regulation, these results do
not apply cross culturally—specifically, researchers did not find this relationship in Malaysia. [9]

Extraversion [edit]

Extraversion is another good predictor of music genre preference and music use. Energetic extroverts have been linked
to preferences in happy, upbeat and conventional music, as well as energetic and rhythmic music, such as rap, hip hop,
soul, electronic, and dance music.[8][11] Additionally, extroverts tend to listen to music more and have background music
present in their lives more often.[23] One study compared introverts and extroverts to see who would be more easily
distracted by background music with and without lyrics. It was assumed that since extroverts listen to background
music more they would be able to tune it out better, but that was proved untrue. No matter how much music people
listen to they are still equally affected and distracted by music with lyrics.[32] Cheerful music with fast tempos, many
melodic themes, and vocals are also preferred by extroverts.[12][10][22] They are more likely than others to listen to
music in the background while doing other activities, such as running, being with friends, or studying.[30][9][8] This group
also tends to use music to counter the monotony of everyday tasks, such as ironing.[9] In a Turkish study, researchers
found that extroverts preferred rock, pop, and rap because these genres facilitated dance and movement.

Another study examined music teachers and music therapists, assuming that people who like and study music would be
more extroverted. The results showed that music teachers were definitely higher in extraversion than the general public.
Music therapists were also higher on extraversion than introversion, though they scored significantly lower than the
teachers. [33] Differences can probably be attributed to teaching being a profession more dependent on extraversion.

Agreeableness [edit]

Agreeable individuals preferred upbeat and conventional music. [11] Additionally, listeners with high agreeableness
displayed an intense emotional response to music which they had never before listened to. [14] Agreeableness is also a
good predictor of the emotional intensity experienced from all types of music, both positive and negative. Those scoring
high in agreeableness tend to have more intense emotional reactions to all types of music.[34]

Neurotism [edit]

The more neurotic a person is, the less likely they are to listen to intense and rebellious music (such as alternative, rock
and heavy metal); they will likely prefer upbeat and conventional music, such as country, sound tracks, and pop
music.[11] Additionally, neuroticism is positively correlated with emotional use of music. [8][7] Those who scored high in
neuroticism were more likely to report use of music for emotional regulation and experience higher intensity of
emotional affect, especially negative emotion.[8][9]

Individual and situational influences on musical preferences [edit]

Situations have been shown to influence individual’s preferences for certain types of music. Participants in a study from
1996 provided information about what music they would prefer to listen to in given situations, and indicated that the
situation greatly determined their musical preferences. For example, melancholic situations called for sad and moody
music, while an arousal situation would call for loud, strong rhythm, invigorating music.[35]
Gender [edit]

Women are more likely than men to respond to music in a more emotional way. [30] Furthermore, females prefer popular
music more than males.[26] In a study of personality and gender in preference for exaggerated bass in music,
researchers found that males demonstrated more of a preference for bass music than females. This preference for bass
music is also correlated with antisocial and borderline personalities.[36]

Age [edit]

Age is a strong factor in determining music preference and age. [13][37] In a study of adolescent preferences of music in
England, researchers found that girls regarded music as a worthwhile activity more than boys, but both boys and girls
agreed that it does not need to be taught in schools. There is also evidence that preferences and opinions toward music
can change with age.[38] In a Canadian study concerning how adolescent music preferences relate to personality,
researchers found that adolescents who preferred heavy music demonstrated low self-esteem, higher levels of
discomfort within the family, and tended to feel rejected by others. Adolescents who preferred light music were
preoccupied with doing the proper thing, and had difficulty balancing independence with dependence. Adolescents who
had eclectic music preferences had less difficulty negotiating adolescence, and were flexible using music according to
mood and particular needs at the time.[39]

Season of the year [edit]

Season of the year can also affect preferences. After reflecting upon fall or winter seasons, participants preferred
reflective and complex music, whereas after reflecting upon summer or spring, participants preferred energetic and
rhythmic music. However, "pop" music seems to have a universal appeal, despite the season.[40]

Familiarity [edit]

Familiarity and complexity both have interesting effects on musical preferences. As seen in other types of artistic media,
an inverted U relationship is apparent when relating subjective complexity on liking music excerpts. Individuals like
complexity to a certain degree, then begin to dislike the music when complexity gets too high. Furthermore, there is a
clear positive monotonic relationship between familiarity and liking of music.[41]

Self views [edit]

Music preferences can also be influenced by how the individual wants to be perceived, especially in males. [8] Music
preferences could be used to make self-directed identity claims. Individuals might select styles of music that reinforce
their self-views. For examples, individuals with a conservative self-view preferred conventional styles of music, while
individuals with an athletic self view preferred vigorous music.[12]

Mood [edit]

Active mood is another factor that affects music preference. Generally whether people are in a good or bad mood when
they hear music affects how they feel about the type of music and also their emotional response.[18] On that line of
thinking, aggression has been shown to improve creativity and emotional intensity derived from music. People with
aggressive disorders find music to be a powerful emotional outlet.[42] Additionally, the value people put on music and
frequency of listening affects their reactions to it. If people listen to a certain type of music and add emotional
experience to songs or a genre in general, this increases the likelihood of enjoying the music and being emotionally
affected by it.[19] This helps explain why many people might have strong reactions to music their parents listened to
frequently when they were children.

See also [edit]

Music psychology
Culture in music cognition
Big Five personality traits

References [edit]

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 V· T · E Music psychology
Biomusicology · Cognitive musicology · Cognitive neuroscience of music · Culture in music cognition ·
Areas
Evolutionary musicology · Psychoacoustics
Absolute pitch · Auditory illusion · Auditory imagery · Background music · Consonance and dissonance ·
Deutsch's scale illusion · Earworm · Embodied music cognition · Entrainment · Exercise and music ·
Eye movement in music reading · Franssen effect · Generative theory of tonal music · Glissando illusion ·
Hedonic music consumption model · Illusory continuity of tones · Levitin effect · Lipps–Meyer law ·
Topics
Melodic expectation · Melodic fission · Mozart effect · Music and emotion · Music and movement ·
Music in psychological operations · Music preference · Music-related memory · Musical gesture ·
Musical semantics · Musical syntax · Octave illusion · Relative pitch · Shepard tone ·
Temporal dynamics of music and language · Tonal memory · Tritone paradox
Amusia · Auditory arrhythmia · Beat deafness · Musical hallucinations · Musician's dystonia ·
Disorders
Music-specific disorders · Tone deafness
Aesthetics of music · Bioacoustics · Ethnomusicology · Hearing · Melodic intonation therapy · Music education ·
Music therapy · Musical acoustics · Musicology · Neurologic music therapy · Neuronal encoding of sound ·
Related fields
Performance science · Philosophy of music · Psychoanalysis and music · Sociomusicology ·
Systematic musicology · Zoomusicology
Jamshed Bharucha · Robert Cutietta · Jane W. Davidson · Irène Deliège · Diana Deutsch · Henkjan Honing ·
Nina Kraus · Carol L. Krumhansl · Fred Lerdahl · Daniel Levitin · Leonard B. Meyer · Max Friedrich Meyer ·
Researchers
James Mursell · Richard Parncutt · Oliver Sacks · Carl Seashore · Roger Shepard · John Sloboda · Carl Stumpf
· William Forde Thompson
Musicophilia · Music, Thought, and Feeling · Psychology of Music (journal) ·
Books and journals
Psychomusicology: Music, Mind and Brain (journal) · The World in Six Songs · This Is Your Brain on Music

Categories: Music cognition Music psychology Psychological attitude

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