Music makes the world go 'round

Michael Balter 3/20/2009 02:50:00 AM Science
It's Science Friday, and what better way to end the week than with a musical interlude--musical research interlude, that is. Today in Science's online news service, ScienceNOW, I report on a study that suggests the ability to detect emotional expression in musical pieces is universal. That's Thomas Fritz of the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany in the photo. He is playing happy, sad, and scary music (by Western standards) to the Mafa people, an isolated ethnic group in the Cameroon many of whom have never heard a radio or listened to Western music in any way. They still do pretty well detecting what emotions are being expressed. The study supports the idea that music is the result of Darwininan evolution, perhaps because it helped cement group solidarity or improved our ability to communicate emotional states.

You can read the entire story here, the link is free for four weeks from today.

Photo credit: Thomas Fritz.
Michael Balter

Posted by Michael Balter

I have been a working journalist for more than 40 years, beginning in Los Angeles as an investigative reporter and then in Paris as a travel, food, and science writer. For more than 20 years I have covered anthropology and archaeology writer for Science, Audubon, Scientific American, SAPIENS, and other publications. I have also covered sexual misconduct for The Verge, Scientific American, and others; I write about mental health, especially schizophrenia; and I engage in occasional media criticism. I returned to the USA in October 2017 after 30 years in Paris, and now live in the New York City area, where I currently teach journalism at City College of New York (I previously taught journalism at Boston University and New York University.) For more about me and what I do, copies of my articles, information about my book, and other goodies, please visit MY WEB SITE

Post a Comment

0 Comments

Post a Comment