Turn on any major pop radio station in the Western world and even with a new song, you might recognize some familiar features: a formulaic structure, themes of romance, a catchy melody in the major scale — all wrapping up in less than three and a half minutes.
Such features of modern music are designed to make the audience feel good, so we listen on repeat. But why do they make us feel good?
For the last few decades, psychologists have wondered if there are features to music that elicit universal emotional responses in humans. That is, if certain elements of music are hard-wired into the human central nervous system.
A recent study tested how different communities with varying levels of exposure to Western music would respond emotionally to major melodies and minor melodies. The study was led by Eline Adrianne Smit and colleagues from the MARCS Institute for Brain, ...
