Music preferences can be influenced by personality traits, researchers say

Have you ever wondered why you like certain songs or genres of music? The answer may lie in your personality, but other factors come into play, researchers say.

Many people tend to form their musical identities around the same time they explore their social identities during adolescence. Tastes can change over time, but research shows that people are particularly fond of adolescent music, and that certain age groups (ages 10 to 30, peaking at 14) find music more easily. have been shown to tend to recall

Music tastes are often identified by preferred genres, but a more accurate way of understanding tastes is by music attributes, researchers say. One model outlines his three dimensions of musical attributes: Arousal, Valence, and Depth.

David M. Greenberg, a researcher at Bar-Ilan University and the University of Cambridge, said: Punk and heavy metal songs, such as Five Finger Death Punch’s “White Knuckles,” have a higher level of arousal, according to a study by Greenberg and colleagues.

“Valence is a spectrum from negative emotions to positive emotions,” he says. Vibrant rock and pop songs like Bill Haley & His Comets’ “Razzle Dazzle” were critically acclaimed.

Depth indicates “levels of both emotional and intellectual complexity,” says Greenberg. “I found rapper Pitbull’s music lacking depth. [and] Classical and jazz music can have depth. ”

There is also an interesting relationship between musical attributes. “Higher depth is often correlated with lower valence, so sadness in music also evokes depth,” he says.

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We like music by artists who share our personality. “When people listen to music, they are driven by how similar the artist is to themselves,” says Greenberg.

In his 2021 study, participants assessed artist personality traits using the Big 5 model: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism (OCEAN). For respondents, David Bowie displayed a high degree of openness and neuroticism. Marvin Gaye, on the other hand, showed a high degree of cooperation.

” [personality of the] Listeners and artists were predicting an artist’s taste in music, not just musical attributes,” says Greenberg.

Personality traits may predict people’s musical tastes, researchers say. In a 2022 study, Greenberg and his colleagues found that participants around the world exhibited personality traits that consistently correlated with their preference for certain genres of Western music, despite sociocultural differences. I discovered that For example, extroversion was associated with a preference for upbeat contemporary music, and openness was associated with a preference for sophisticated and intellectual styles.

The secret math behind soothing music

Our cognitive style and the way we think can also predict the kind of music we like. His 2015 study by Greenberg and his colleagues distinguishes between systemizers and empatizers (those who understand the world through their thoughts and feelings, and those who are concerned with rules and systems). “Empaths tend to like sadness in music, [systemizers] I prefer more intense music,” said Greenberg. “A lot of IT [and] data science expert [are] He is good at systematizing and likes very intense music. ”

Also, both empersizers and systemizers listen to music with depth, but empersizers prefer attributes that express emotional depth, while systemizers prefer attributes that express intellectual depth and technical complexity. I like

Personality may be one of the determinants of our musical tastes, but another factor may be context. Minsu Park and his colleagues identified temporal patterns of listening behavior. People tend to listen to relaxing music in the evening and energetic music during the day. “This variation is about the same regardless of cultural location or other demographic information,” says Park, an assistant professor of social research and public policy at New York University Abu Dhabi.

However, there are baseline differences between people from different cultures. In Latin America, people tend to listen to “music that is more stimulating than people in other regions”, and in Asia, people tend to listen to “music that is more relaxing”. [than] People from other regions,” says Park.

Age and gender are also associated with certain types of music. According to Greenberg’s research, young people tend to like intense music, and older people tend to dislike it. Listeners of mellow music are more likely to be female, and listeners of intense music are more likely to be male in the Western Hemisphere.

There is also an age-dependent relationship with music.

A 2013 study, which looked at data from two surveys of more than 250,000 individuals, found that “young people listen to music much more frequently than middle-aged adults, and young people listen to music in a variety of situations. While adults listen to music in a variety of contexts, they mostly listen to music in private situations.”

What kind of music do psychopaths like? More Bieber, less Bach.

Personality can affect our musical tastes, but it’s important to note that a change in musical taste does not indicate a change in personality. remains the same person implicitly.

“Introverts can change over time, but ultimately their core [and] The foundation is introversion,” says Greenberg.

Greenberg created a 35-question quiz that provides insight into personality and musical tastes. To take the exam, Visit this site.