Psychology Today: Turn Down the Volume to Turn Down the Pain
Listening to music and other sounds at a low volume can help reduce pain.
Music Can Ease the Pain
It's been known for some time that listening to music can reduce the amount of pain people feel when undergoing a painful experience. An international team of scientists recently conducted a study with mice in an attempt to solve this mystery. The researchers injected the mice’s paws with a solution that caused inflammation and then, while exposing them to music as well as to a white noise source, prodded their paws with thin filaments and observed their response to the painful stimulus (e.g., licking, flinching). As in previous studies, exposure to music reduced the mice’s sensitivity to pain. Using viral tracing, microendoscopic calcium imaging, and multielectrode recordings to trace connections between brain regions, the researchers identified a pathway from the auditory cortex to the thalamus (the auditory cortex receives and processes sound information and the thalamus relays sensory signals, including pain, from the body). In the presence of music, neuronal activity at the receiving end of this pathway was reduced, suggesting a reduction of pain processing in the thalamus.
Volume Makes the Difference
In addition to identifying a neural mechanism involved in the analgesic effect of music, the study also produced an unexpected discovery involving the volume at which the music was played. Surprisingly, the type of music to which the mice were exposed, whether pleasant or otherwise, made no difference in the mice’s response. Nor did the substitution of white noise for music. The mice's response to the pain stimulus was identical in the presence of all three types of sound. The intensity at which the music and white noise were played, however, did make a difference in the mice's response to the pain stimulus. Whether the mice were exposed to pleasant music, unpleasant music, or just white noise, only the sounds that were played at a lower volume—just slightly above background noise level—produced the pain-numbing effect.
Read the full article here!
Reflection: Have you ever experienced that music has made something that would feel painful or uncomfortable, feel less painful and more enjoyable instead? Share your experiences!
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@professionalVision2624
This was so interesting to read! I did not know that listening to music can reduce the amount of pain. I noticed that when I am worried or stressed music makes it better but I have not noticed this with physical pain yet.
@globalBraid3744
Yes! I have also noticed it helps with emotional pain like reducing anxiety and stress but I did not know it can reduce physical pain as well. I know that "heartbreak" lists exist for people to listen to after a relationship has ended to help reduce their emotional pain, but maybe in the near future some music for physical pain can pop up as a playlist. Would be amazing to see chronic pain sufferers! Thank you so much for reading and sharing your throughts!
