Pop Music as Therapy

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Pop Music as Therapy

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Call it crazy but a new study conducted by Northwestern University and Lurie Children’s Hospital is suggestion that listening to pop music can have beneficial impacts to children recovering from surgery. The study was headed by doctor Santhanam Suresh and involved 54 children/patients split into three groups; one that listened to audiobooks, one that listened to music, and one that received no musical treatment.

The study measured the perceptions of the pain patients aged 9-14 felt they were in following surgery using visual aids such as happy/sad faces for the children to identify with. The results suggested that the groups that listened to either audiobooks or music reported less pain during therapy and is paving the way for audio-therapy as a cost effective alternative to costly and dangerously strong medicines.

The science behind the study is that the brain processes pain in the same way that it learns and having the music or story as a distraction cheats the brain and redirects mental paths during therapy. In some cases the audiobooks would help children fall asleep, providing the white noise that eased them off.

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