Music & Studying

Essential Question What are the questions do you have about this topic? Does music help me when studying? Or is it more of a distraction?

Background Research According to Stanford University Professor Clifford Nass, the human brain listens to song lyrics with the same part that does word processing, which is the same part that supposedly is being employed for studying, he said. Instrumental music is another story. For the most part, it is processed on the other side of the brain from the part that is processing language. “So if you are reading and listening to instrumental music you get virtually no interference,” Nass said. “The music would not, in fact affect you, unless you are thinking deeply about the music, like, ‘I wonder why Chopin chose the F sharp.’” http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/checking-it-out/checking-it-out-does-music-int.html

Background Research cont. Music may harm your studying, study says If you're studying for a test, putting on background music that you like may seem like a good idea. But if you're trying to memorize a list in order - facts, numbers, elements of the periodic table - the music may actually be working against you, a new study suggests. Researchers at the University of Wales Institute in Cardiff, United Kingdom, looked at the ability to recall information in the presence of different sounds. They instructed 25 participants between ages 18 and 30 try to memorize, and later recall, a list of letters in order. The study authors are Nick Perham and Joanne Vizard, and the study will appear in the September 2010 issue of Applied Clinical Psychology. Participants were tested under various listening conditions: quiet, music that they'd said they liked, music that they'd said they didn't like, a voice repeating the number three, and a voice reciting random single-digit numbers. The study found that participants performed worst while listening to music, regardless of whether they liked that music, and to the speech of random numbers. They did the best in the quiet and while listening to the repeated "three."

Background Research Cont. Music may impair cognitive abilities in these scenarios because if you're trying to memorize things in order, you may get thrown off by the changing words and notes in your chosen song, the authors speculate. Although other studies have found benefits to listening to music before performing a task, the authors note that this new research presents a more realistic scenario: hearing music at the same time as doing the expected task. In the 1990s, listening to the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was thought to increase spatial abilities, but subsequent research failed to find the same effect. But other studies have found a "Schubert effect" for people who like the music of Franz Schubert, and a "Stephen King" effect for people who liked a narrated story by that author. The explanation for all of this could be that when you hear something you like, it heightens your arousal and mood, which improves performance, Perham and Vizard note. The new study does not necessarily contradict those previous findings, but does suggests some limitations on the benefits of music in memorizing lists of things in order, the authors wrote. It may still be the case that listening to music before performing a task like that helps cognitive abilities. But this new research suggests that it might be better to study for an exam in quiet, or listen to music beforehand. http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2010/07/27/music-may-harm-your-studying-study-says/

Purpose What are the questions do you have about this topic? I chose to do this experiment because I wanted to investigate the affect that music has on me when I am studying. I often listen to music when studying for tests and I am curious if it is helping me focus or if I am retaining less information when listening to music. I want to provide teenagers with the results to help them achieve the best grades possible.

Hypothesis “I think that if………..then……..” (Your prediction of what will happen) If music has lyrics, the subjects will remember less information.

Variables a.) Independent variable(s): the variable you change in the experiment Type of music- with lyrics, instrumental, no music b.) Dependent variable(s): the variable you are measuring in the experiment. The number of words recalled/memory

Experimental Controls The variables that will remain constant throughout your experiment. Number of words Complexity of words Size of words Length of time to study the words Volume of music Length of music.

Materials Materials required complete/perform the experiment. CD player/iPod Overhead projector Music- with lyrics, instrumental Word list Paper/pencil

Procedure Indicate the steps you must take to complete the experiment. These should be detailed, numbered and in the correct order. Another person should be able to follow your procedure to perform the experiment. 1. Explain to the group that they will be shown a list of words while listening to music. They will be given x amount of time to study the words. When the music stops they will be given x amount of time to write the words they remember on the chart provided. 2. Play music with lyrics for x seconds. 3. Stop music. 4. Remove list from overhead. 5. Allow subjects x seconds to write as many words as they can recall. 6. Repeat steps 2-5 for instrumental music 7. Repeat steps 2-5 with no music. 8. Collect data from subjects.

Safety List any safety warnings precautions Overhead projector may be hot.

Experimental Observations Results & Observations: (Use your notes from your experiment and organize the information into tables.) Type of Music Tally- # of Words Music with lyrics Music without lyrics No music

Diagram/Graph Organize your results into a graph that best displays the results of your data. For example….

Analysis Explain/interpret your graph. Describe in detail what your graph shows.

Conclusion Explain what was discovered. What was the overall lesson of the project? Explain how this can be applied to society and to people in the world and in daily life. This should be approximately two paragraphs. Make sure to refer back to your hypothesis.

Sources of Error (What in your experiment could have led to bias or in-accurate results?)