The Neuroscience of Music: An Interdisciplinary Study of the Effects of Music on the Brain

The human brain has evolved into a system which can analyze sound and assign meaningful associations to that stimulus. Studying the human brain with respect to music leads us to ask, why people make music, how people perceive the music and how does music influence the human body? Dancing, playing music, listening to music, and singing all have affective responses. Humans can use their body to move to music or can use their body to produce music. Dance as an “orchestration of energy” is a very deep biochemical experience which produces a rush of neurotransmitters in the brain thereby inducing many different sensations and emotions. Singing and the emotional impact of sound affects the body through the vagus nerve, which passes through the ear, extends into the larynx and all the internal organs including the entire intestinal tract, back muscles, lungs and heart. It carries the fibers that control the release of gastric and pancreatic secretions, and inhibitory fibers of the heart. This dissertation considers the healing properties of music. It studies the insula, a very unified center of the brain that connects different functional systems such as sensory, emotional, and cognitive processing and is also responsible for processing both positive, negative, and socially appropriate emotions. The results of two quantitative pilot studies through brain imaging scans on the healing effects of music and dance on Parkinson’s disease are introduced. Statistical data presented without assessing the emotions of the participants who undergo the difficult process of sickness and aging is rigid science which lacks the information on the hidden, vulnerable sides of human beings. Since music and dance deal with the psyche and the body together, a conversation with one of the participants is added to understand the feelings regarding the inability of science alone in dealing with an incurable disease and the hope that music brings for a better quality of life.