Untitled Document
 Do
you like music? I bet many of you love listening to music. It can
relieve your stress and make you feel happier. But did you know that
music is actually good for your brain, too? Playing a musical
instrument can help you become smarter!
A new study found that children who study a musical instrument for
at least 3 years outdo other children even
in non-musical skills. The study was conducted
by Harvard University researchers. The researchers
studied 41 young children aged 8 to 11 years old to
learn about the relation between practicing music
and intelligence. The results of the study was
published on October 29 in the online research journal PLoS One.
According to the researchers,
the kids who had learned a musical instrument for at least 3 years
were found to excel in many tests compared to the children
without musical training. For example, the
young musicians’ language skills
were better than the non-musician group.
 The
researchers found that the longer and more intensely a child had studied
his or her instrument, the better they scored on vocabulary and other tests.
“Our study shows that music has positive effects on children’s intelligence.
We are sure that learning music can make kids smart,” said the Harvard
researchers.
Many other studies also show that learning to play a musical instrument
can enhance other capabilities
in a child’s brain. According to the 1997 UCLA study, playing music improves students’ test scores
in many tests as well as in reading proficiency exams. The researchers
studied 25,000 students for 10 years. They found that high school
students who played music scored higher on the math and verbal portion of SAT compared to non-music
students.
 The study
also found that students who play the piano could understand mathematical and scientific concepts more easily. Also, the IQs of
young students who had 9 months of weekly training in piano
were higher than untrained kids.
Another study showed that music students received more academic honors and awards than non-music students.
These music students also have more A and B grades compared to non-music
students.
But why does this happen? Researchers think
that since music-learning involves appreciating the
length of notes in proportion to others,
when a child plays music, he or she exercises the part of their
brain that processes proportional thinking.
“There are so many different parts involved in learning to play
music ? such as memorizing, expressing emotion, learning about musical interval and chords. The multi-dimensional nature of the experience may be motivating
the IQ effect,” said study researcher E. Glenn Schellenberg of the
University of Toronto. |
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