Music: the Ultimate Emotional Regulation Tool
by Taylor Palmer
Humans are a uniquely musical species. We don’t often consider how incredible that is. You don’t need to compose symphonies or even play an instrument to appreciate your favourite song. Whether you want to groove tonight with Earth, Wind & Fire, lose yourself in the moment with Eminem, or, like Joan Jett, you simply love rock ‘n roll, chances are music plays a role in your life. It transcends language, brings people together, and impacts their mood. In fact, emotional regulation is the most cited reason for listening to music. By understanding why music impacts our mood, we can explore the many ways it helps us through difficult emotions.
The profound impact of music can be explained in part by its role in human history. There is a whole body of psychological research dedicated to whether music played a role in our survival as a species. One of the most plausible evolutionary explanations proposes song began as a tool to regulate infant arousal. Music provides a pathway to communication that is beyond words, allowing parents to soothe those who have yet to develop their own emotional regulation skills. Many have also supposed music to have magical effects. From Indigenous societies to classical philosophers like Plato, people have long believed in the magical and/or curative properties of song. The relationship between music and emotion evidently reaches far into our collective past.
People use music to regulate their emotions in a multitude of ways. As a species, we generally prefer happy-sounding music, and research supports a link between listening to music and positive mood, regardless of the mood of the music itself. Some use music to access certain memories or relive emotional experiences. Perhaps listening to your favourite song reminds you of the first time you heard it, or the person who introduced it to you. Music has the power to transport the listener, and leaning into musical memories evokes the positive feelings of those experiences. Others may simply use music to escape the present moment and distract from overwhelming emotions. For the daydreamers of the world, music can provide a soundtrack to your thought processes and inspire the twists and turns of your internal narrative. Sometimes we need space from strong feelings, and music occupies the senses so we can focus on grounding rather than spiralling.
Not everyone wants to escape their emotions, however. Listening to mood congruent music can help discharge overwhelming emotions, like when we cry along to a sad song. And music helps us to move through our feelings literally as well as figuratively. Humans are rhythmic beings, from our heartbeats and brainwaves to our habits and routines, and movement can help unlock and process pent up feelings. Moving rhythmically to music can be powerful tool in regulating intense emotions. Simply put, it’s hard to have a break down when you’re breaking it down on the dance floor.
Last and perhaps most importantly of all, music reminds us we are not alone. Entire generations bond over the music of their adolescence. Studies have found dementia patients who listened to the music of their teen years experienced improvements in mood even without memory of the songs themselves. It can be a comfort to acknowledge the same songs evoke similar feelings in thousands, even millions, of listeners. While dancing alone in your bedroom can be healing, moving together in a crowd can make us feel part of something greater than ourselves. Give into the music and let it remind you that you are far from alone.
Taylor Palmer (B.A. Psychology) is a writer, performer, and creator whose work has been featured in festivals across Canada, including the Reel 2 Real Film Festival. They currently work from Vancouver, BC.