Children climbing the walls, jumping on furniture, excited voices getting louder and louder as your sanity goes out of the window – is Mozart making our children wild? The answer to this question sadly, is no.
-The Mozart effect- is something entirely different!
Interested? Read on!
Most of us have heard somewhere along the grapevine that classical music is good for children, and sometimes even plants alike (is there, I wonder a pied piper, piping lullabies to the tired, swaying rose bush?), and once being a musician myself, I was more than a little keen to find some sort of support for this idea.
This is what I found:
Some researchers, like Frances Raucher published some studies that suggest musical training in pre-school aged children significantly enhanced their spatial-temporal skills (right about now, I’m wondering what happened to me, my spatial skills are appalling). Not only this, but the same researchers also found that after listening to a Mozart sonata, students (uni aged) spatial-reasoning skills related to varying mathematical skills were improved. Cunningly these researchers then named this, -The Mozart Effect-. However, as I delved deeper into the research, I discovered that the “Mozart Effect” has since been debunked by other studies. It turns out that while music can have a positive impact on cognitive development and learning, it is not limited to just Mozart’s compositions.
In fact, any type of music can potentially provide benefits for children. According to a study published in Psychology of Music, playing background music during various tasks can improve attention and memory recall. This means that whether your child is listening to classical or pop music, it could still have a positive effect on their brain development.
But why does music have this impact? Well, it all boils down to how our brains process sound. When we listen to music, multiple areas of our brain are activated, including those responsible for emotions, movement, and even language. This stimulation can help with the development of these areas in children.
Additionally, music can also provide a way for children to express themselves and explore their creativity. It allows them to experiment with different sounds, rhythms, and melodies. This type of creative play can enhance problem-solving skills and promote abstract thinking.
So will little Harry’s lifelong exposure to Mozart mean a life dedicated to being the stereotypical manic mathematician? Sadly, at this point, nobody really knows, and they certainly can’t predict that outcome. In the experiment mentioned above with university students, the effect was somewhat short lived – lasting for a period of 10-15 minutes.