EMPATHY AND MUSIC

A recent study done by Southern Methodist University, Dallas and UCLA has revealed evidence for a music-empathy connection in the brain. Their study is one of the first to utilized functional resonance imaging (fMRI) to study how empathy is processed.So far they have concluded that music is processed similarly in the brains of highly empathetic and low empathetic individuals with one major difference. When compared to the low empathic participants, the high empathic participants processed familiar music using more of the reward center of the brain and social areas that are involved in feeling empathy toward other. If you would like to learn more about how this study was conducted you can find the article here: https://neurosciencenews.com/empathy-music-processing-9313/

References:

“Neurophysiological Effects of Trait Empathy in Music Listening” by Zachary Wallmark, Choi Deblieck, and Marco Iacoboni in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. Published April 6 2018