Study: Some People Have No Emotional Response to Music

Posted by freedomforall 9 years, 2 months ago to Science
34 comments | Share | Flag

Note: This study probably didn't cost US taxpayers anything (unless Spain used US aid to pay for it.)
Psychologists at the University of Barcelona stumbled upon this while they were screening participants for a study by using responses to music to gauge emotion. They were surprised to find that music wasn't important at all to about 5 percent of the people — they said they didn't bob up and down to tunes they liked, didn't get weepy, didn't get chills. It was like they couldn't feel the music at all.
SOURCE URL: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/03/06/286786987/for-some-people-music-truly-doesnt-make-them-happy


Add Comment

FORMATTING HELP

All Comments Hide marked as read Mark all as read

  • Posted by Snoogoo 9 years, 2 months ago
    Maybe they just played crappy music.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
    • Posted by H2ungar123 9 years, 2 months ago
      Treat them to Glen Miller's "Moonlight
      Serenade" or Harry James' "You Made Me
      Love You" or Artie Shaw's "Stardust" - each
      one a modern-day killer thriller!!
      Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
      • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 2 months ago
        Oh, H2, you and I could easily spend a few hours listening to the great big band music that is almost lost today. And by mentioning those three, you bring to mind all the others like Tommy Dorsey, and other kings of swing.
        Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
        • Posted by H2ungar123 9 years, 2 months ago
          OMG Brother Herb!! Mentioning Tommy D.
          brings to mind Jimmy Dorsey, Charlie Barnett,
          Gene Krupa - I'm gonna start to cry!! And
          the great Ella Fitzgerald!! Louie Armstrong =
          here come the tears!!! Thanx!!
          Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
          • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 2 months ago
            Speaking of Tommy Dorsey, I was also a trombonist. I toured with the Buddy Morrow band for a year before I realized I loved playing with the band, but hated touring. I met Buddy again at Busch Gardens about ten years ago. He didn't remember me. I hate to think that I was only 19 back then, and I remember thinking of him as an older guy -- he must have been all of 30. To me, we played real music, jazz and swing. No one knew anything about guitars. We were four saxes, three trumpets three trombones, a string bass, a piano, drums, two singers and Buddy. One sax player doubled on clarinet, another doubled on flute, and we had two guys who arranged, and I also made a couple of arrangements. Man, that was a loooong time ago.
            Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
            • Posted by H2ungar123 9 years, 2 months ago
              Herb! How impressive!! And you even made
              some arrangements! WOW! I played piano
              but never toured and played, like you stated,
              REAL music which we just don't hear anymore. Speaking of Buddy Morrow reminds me of another drummer, Buddy Rich! That guy was something else! Agree
              with you.....a looooong time ago!
              me
              Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
              • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 2 months ago
                The reason I got hired is that one of his trombone men couldn't get up while in Detroit (probably too drunk) and he needed someone who could play a pedal B Flat for his theme song "Night Train." It required a large bore trombone, which I had. I answered an ad and there I was. They used to say that Buddy Rich had the fastest hands of any drummer. He could do a single stroke drum roll so fast his hands became a blur.
                Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
                • Posted by H2ungar123 9 years, 2 months ago
                  Hey Herb! "It's Make Believe Ball-Room Time" Let's Dance! Been great taking this walk down Memory Lane with you. You still
                  have the large bore trombone??? I still have my piano....Happy New Year to you and yours....

                  Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
                  • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 2 months ago
                    Nope. I use a fancy keyboard now. I gave the 'bone to a music teacher and made him swear that he'd give it to a kid who showed talent and a desire to learn. I went to hear him play with the high school band. He was already better than me and he was only 16.
                    Happy New Year -- Health * Love * Prosperity
                    Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by johnpe1 9 years, 2 months ago
    I spent 50 years toting music and dj gear around,
    for friends and compatriots at work, and there
    definitely were people who were neutral or
    negative about the music -- some nearly violent.......
    we had to develop a method of "turning it down"
    which just involved changing the equalizer curve
    to reduce the intensity of the strong stuff (coulda
    used a compressor, but didn't have one).
    then, gradually, we returned to the full intensity
    to see if they'd complain again. . made it a game.

    good music reproduced faithfully can really help
    a lot of people enjoy life -- and explore the range
    from Warren Kime to Liz Story to Booker T to
    The Strawberry Alarm Clock to Glenn Miller to
    Bob Seger to Karen Carpenter to the Pointer
    Sisters to Stevie Wonder to Joanie Madden to
    Chet Atkins to Ronnie Milsap to Vladimir Horowitz
    to Jimi Hendrix to Mary Costa to Garth Hudson --
    and there is always room for more!!! -- j

    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by fivedollargold 9 years, 2 months ago
    Good point Frodo. Research clearly demonstrates that anti-socials show little or no response to emotionally-laden words. $5Au will check the literature re: music.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by jpellone 9 years, 2 months ago
    That 5% must have been dead!!! I'm not much for country music but my mom had me check out the song "Daddy's Hands" about 10 years ago and I must admit that song should stir something in all men or daughters!!!
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by RonC 9 years, 2 months ago
    Maybe those +-5% are candidates to become psychopaths? It is said they don't feel any emotion from the crimes they commit. Maybe not feeling music is the superset to an even less feeling subset.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 9 years, 2 months ago
    I'd be interested to know what percentage of listeners have a positive response to modern atonal music. It seems to have a following, even though most people dislike it.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ allosaur 9 years, 2 months ago
    That 5% are just shape-shifting space alien lizards from outer space. I've surfed four sites on the subject. Obama is one but his blame Bush is one also.
    So it is just an invasion of cold-blooded unfeeling thus unmusical creatures instead it being a political or a philosophical anything to worry about. And they all have jobs.
    Believe you me, we have a lot more Hispanic illegal aliens to worry about than insidious shape-shifting imposter people.
    Trusssssst your old dino in the Gulch, there issssss nothing to worry about. Hissss-have a niccccce day.

    http://mujca.com/deathlizards.htm
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
    • Posted by Non_mooching_artist 9 years, 2 months ago
      OMG these people are serious!! Oh I laughed, but stopped abruptly, because they believe this tripe! I mean, it's possible, probable even, that ovomit isn't human, but...
      Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
      • Posted by $ allosaur 9 years, 2 months ago
        There is much more to such madness. I know someone who is involved with therianthropes, people who think they are shape shifters.
        This is a fantasy world subculture actually talks to each other on websites. Below is a link to newbies introducing themselves at one such site.
        I don't think an allosaur could impress anyone here. These flakes are more of the "woof! woof!" variety.

        http://forums.therianthropy.org/forumdis...

        Bwahaha! or Coo-coo! Your choice.

        http://www.angelfire.com/ketrino/shapesh...
        Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
        • Posted by Non_mooching_artist 9 years, 2 months ago
          I cannot believe this... Wow. Things make soooo much more sense now, like how the freak in the Oval Office was elected not once, but twice.... I'm stunned here. Incredulous, really..
          Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
          • Posted by $ allosaur 9 years, 2 months ago
            I see you have selected "coo-coo," the rational choice.
            "Bwa-ha-ha!" would be what Comrade Citizen, my Mr. Hyde, would say, for he would feel empowered by the fairy tale notion of shape-shifting.
            Comrade Citizen would be an Obama voter if he were really real.
            Logical people can creatively make up characters. Ayn Rand could. Maybe not as silly.
            Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by Owlsrayne 9 years, 2 months ago
    I myself love different kinds of music from Classic Rock, Anime Music, Christian Music and a number of contemporary artists. The most soaring piece of music is Beck's Bolero by Jeff Beck, Tribal Music-Scatterings of Africa by Johnny Clegg, Russian Metal-Slavsia by Arkona, Gregorian-Deus by Vox Nova, and Contemporary Christian-Need You Now by Plumb. That just a smattering of the music I like.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by wdg3rd 9 years, 2 months ago
    30 volunteers, and 5% had no response? If there were 20 subjects, 5% would be exactly one of them. To get an even 5% with more than one such, you need 40 subjects. 30 subjects is in the middle of that (maybe somebody brought his dog).
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 2 months ago
    One can only treat this as a disability like autism. My sympathies go out to those poor individuals who have no response to music. They are unable to grasp one of the human race's great achievements in art.
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ MikeMarotta 9 years, 2 months ago
    This is interesting. I mean, some people are aphasic (cannot read) and too many suffer from innumeracy (inability to think with numbers). But those are not "natural." Sure, misreading a lion paw for a deer print is consequential, but nothing is natural about differentiating p q b d - R P B - M W - O Q.

    But music is probably deeper and older than language. For birds music is language. So, it would be expectable that in a state of nature people could tell music - birds, coyotes, wind in the trees …

    Asperger's (a pseudo-label, but handy) posits individuals who cannot read the emotional states of others from their facial expressions. That seems "unnatural" yet, there it is. Was Gilgamesh an Aspie? (Even if so, he apparently used music - chants - to get his city walls built.)
    Reply | Mark as read | Best of... | Permalink  

FORMATTING HELP

  • Comment hidden. Undo