Music as sex and drugs

2011/01/15 Galarraga Aiestaran, Ana - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Biokimika
• Anatomia/Fisiologia

Specifically, researchers have found that dopamine production increases by listening to the music of their taste. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter related to the pleasure produced by the brain by acquiring the necessary to live. Thus, when obtaining food or sex, the brain secretes dopamine and activates the remuneration mechanism: feeling pleasure encourages motivation and promotes adherence to the source of pleasure.

From an evolutionary point of view, this is an unbeatable mechanism, as it pushes us to try to get the things we need to survive. However, the side effect is that psychoactive substances activate this same mechanism, so they create dependence.

And music, what does it have to be like sex and drugs? Music is not essential to live, but listening generates pleasure; in all cultures there is a fondness for music, and although the music you like from one person to another can be totally different, the influence is similar in all. All this made us suspect that music could be related to dopamine.

To check (or override) suspicion, researchers at McGill University of Canada conducted an experiment. They have brought together young people aged 19 to 24, all music lovers but not experts or musicians, and those who like different musical styles, from classical to jazz, technician or punk.

The researchers made them hear their taste and neutral music, while meditating a series of physical parameters: heart rate, electrical conductivity of the skin, body temperature, breathing... This confirms the physical reaction of the favorite music. It is worth noting the exclusive use of instrumental music, since it is known that the voice of people deeply influences the brain and that researchers wanted to rule out the influence of this variable.

By the brain

The brain activity of the participants is analyzed below. Two techniques have been used: positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). With the first one you can see if dopamine production increases and with the second, where and how much it is released.

Thus, they have shown that listening to favorite music generates dopamine and, in addition, they have discovered that the response of the brain advances. In fact, dopamine emission begins a few seconds before hearing the favorite musical part, in a certain area of the brain. Then, when the most exciting part comes to oneself, it flows elsewhere. In fact, the first area relates to the system of anticipation and anticipation and the other to emotions.

According to researchers, the experiment helps to understand why music influences people so much. Dopamine emission can explain the effectiveness of music in rituals, marketing or therapy. On the other hand, they point out that it is the starting point for the analysis of abstract sources of pleasure. The research has been published in the journal Nature Neuroscience and can be read complete on its website.

Published in Gara