The Science and Psychology Behind Music and Emotion

Music has been used for thousands of years as a means of emotional expression. The goals of this paper are to (a) review current literature on how music induces emotion (b) explore the mechanisms of how this happens both physiologically and psychologically and (c) to look at the role of desired effect and musical preference to move towards a general conclusion of what drives listeners’ musical choices. This paper approaches this by looking at structural theories of music including those of Krumhansl (1997) that music has inherent qualities that instill specific responses in the listener. The paper then continues by addressing a Jungian perspective often employed in music therapy. Here, music is used to express what is otherwise inexpressible. The Behavioral Perspective section postulates that music can prime listeners by making them predisposed through associations to feel positive or negative emotions.