How Does Music Affect Our Emotions

Music is an element of culture that has been growing and evolving for thousands of years. Music allows communities and cultures to connect together through thousands of different styles of music. Music consists of many components that allows each genre to express a level of emotion within the song, which also contributes to the music itself impacting our mental state and emotions. Listening and experiencing music is very influential on our mental state, if we are feeling sad we choose low, slower music, but when we are happy our music tends to be upbeat. Musical therapy can affect a patient's brain to calm and stimulate brain chemicals to soothe the patient in stressful situations. Music impacts our mental state because of the brains emotional processing system and the chemicals released while listening to it. Whether we are happy or sad, music is a mechanism that impacts our moods. Listening to

While we listen to music, the brain is stimulated in the frontal lobe, amygdala, and hippocampus, which are the main areas that control our emotions. The hippocampus is connected to emotional responses which impacts the release of brain chemicals. Stefan Koelsch explains the impact the hippocampus has to do with music, “The fact that the hippocampus reacts to emotional music (including fear and joy) suggests that it is responsive to the potential of music to stimulate the release of brain chemicals that affect its function, by virtue of that music’s emotional associations and core meaning” ( Williamson). Music has a big impact on brain stimulation. As our brain is stimulated it produces chemicals that can also impact our mood, “Listening to music increases the neurotransmitter dopamine. Dopamine is the brain’s “motivation molecule” and an integral part of the pleasure-reward system” (Alban). Music increases motivation along with happiness within the