Topic for Feb 18 (Tue)

[Kristin55]

Music May Affect How We Remember the Past

Music can make us feel all sorts of different emotions. There might be a certain song that reminds you of a time of your life — a particular day or moment.

Maybe it's the song that was playing when you met your partner, or when you last saw your best friend.

But according to new research, music may be able to do more than just bring back memories — it could even affect the way we remember the past.

Researchers in the US did an experiment in which participants were asked to memorize a number of short stories that were described as "emotionally neutral."

A day later, the participants were asked to think about these stories while listening to positive music, negative music or silence. They also had MRI scans to measure their brain activity while listening and thinking about the stories.

Then the next day, they were asked to recall the stories without listening to any music.

The researchers found that when people were thinking about the stories and listening to emotional music, they were more likely to incorporate new "emotional elements" into the story that matched the music.

For example, if they were listening to positive music when recalling the story, they were more likely to remember the story in a positive way, even when they recalled the story later and the music was not playing.

The researchers also saw increased activity in the parts of participants' brains associated with emotional memory processing while people were listening to music and thinking about the stories.

The research team said this may explain why music associated with an important life event can feel so powerful when we listen to it again later.

They also said the idea of using music to impact memories could be useful for helping people with things like depression.