Some prefer to toil in silence, but others have to blare their favorite tunes to help them be productive. In the end, it is a matter of personal preference.
Endless scientific studies about the music’s effect on our brains and emotions have been going on since the 1950s, but humans have been using music to communicate thoughts and emotions for centuries.
Today, even scientific researches have backed the popular theory that listening to music while working can actually be beneficial. A 2017 study by Dutch and Australian scientists has shown that listening to happy music helped to improve the participants’ ‘divergent thinking’.
Similarly, a 2015 research by The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America revealed that using ambient natural sounds like flowing stream and raining is an effective way to improve productivity and moods in the workplace.
OK, since now we know that listening to music while working is backed by science as well, blare up your headphones and listen to your favorite song as we dig deeper to know how exactly does listening to music during work helps.
Reduced stress
What is life without a bunch of little stressors at work? Often, there are days when your mood will incline on the side of irritable or grumpy. When the anxiety seems to seep in, listening to your favorite song or band can significantly decrease the stress levels. Listening to music will release feel-good chemicals like oxytocin and serotonin that are known to elevate moods. Similarly, it will help reduce the production of stress-related hormones like cortisol and norepinephrine. And once you have a positive mood, you can easily put your heart and mind into any work you do, and get it done to perfection.
Helps you visualize better
The Mozart Effect theory, which claims that listening to Mozart while working will make you smarter, is still up for debates. While recent researches tend to disagree with these claims, it hasn’t stopped hordes of listeners from playing his music while working. Thanks to studies, it is widely believed that listening to classical music can improve spatial-temporal reasoning or the capability to manipulate shapes mentally – although for a specific. This effect is however not just limited to Mozart but also other classical maestros.
Makes work fun
While the jury hasn’t still decided on whether listening to music can benefit everyone or just specifically wired people, there is no denying that the work-life will be a lot duller and tedious without it. A little bit of The Smiths or The Weeknd, whatever your music choice is, is all you need for that extra dose of confidence and motivation to get your head down and crack on with your work. Moreover, since listening to music has been proven to release dopamine, listening to music will help you feel motivated and relaxed to work.
Makes repetitive tasks easier
When we evaluate music’s effectiveness in increasing productive output, an important element to consider is how ‘immersive’ the task at hand is. While synthesis works demand a lot of creativity, oftentimes, we end up doing the same kind of works for days on end. Researches have shown that music is effective in raising efficiency in repetitive works even when in competition with the unfavorable conditions produced by the machine. More specifically, subjects listening to background music achieved higher productivity when BGM was in the major mode. For students, Music can help to perform revision again and again.
Helps to improve memory
Ever wondered why it is easier to memorize lyrics of Tupac’s song than the table of chemical elements? It is because your brain looks for patterns to better understand, recall, and process information. So, when you are listening to a particular song while working, your brain latches on to the pattern of the song and work, which will eventually help you to memorize and recall the work that is currently on hand.
However, it is strongly suggested that choosing the right type of music aids in determining the worker’s work productivity. For example, songs with complicated or very sentimental lyrics can be distracting as the listener will start to focus on the message of the songs. Similarly, if you are listening to a piece of music for the first time, it is quite obvious that you will pay more attention to it than your work.
So, instead of harsh, high-pitched, and loud music, listening to soothing and soft music like jazz, classical, folk songs, or just instrumentals can be beneficial.
Find Songs and Music for Work on ListenOnRepeat
So, why the delay? Head on to ListenOnRepeat and listen to your favorite work jam to give you a head start. If you are feeling a little too creative, create an exclusive playlist on ListenOnRepeat with upbeat songs like Katy Perry’s to set you in the mood. If lyrics and loud music are too distracting for your choice, you can also find hundreds of soothing and chill songs to help you concentrate. My personal favorite is beats by Lofi Hip Hop Radio, which has been repeated on ListenOnRepeat over 100 thousand times!
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