It is almost impossible to imagine our way of modern life without any music. There are so many ways for us to hear music, such as listening to the radio, go to concerts or play a musical instrument ourselves. According to the Dutch Radio Advice Bureau, 60 percent of the Dutch population owns and listens to their own radio installation and 66 percent listens to the radio in the car (Dutch Cowboys, 2013). These numbers show that music, indeed, is involved in a lot of people’s lives. On top of that, it has been proven that listening to music is an effective mood enhancer (Radstaak, Geurts, Brosschot, & Kompier, 2014).
Besides the improved mood one might get from hearing music, listening to music can also improve our memory (Dowling & Tillman, 2013). Before music is stored in our memory, it must be processed and categorized in order for us to recall it later. There seems to be a specialized music module that helps us processing the music. Support for the existence of this module comes from people with selective impairments in music abilities after brain damage (Peretz & Coltheart, 2003). They might be …show more content…
Explicit memory is a conscious, intentional memory while implicit memory is characterized by a lack of conscious awareness (Kerer et al., 2013). Then again, explicit musical memory can be divided into episodic and semantic musical memory. Episodic musical memory is the ability to retrieve spatiotemporal, personal and emotional contexts of the musical experience, for example remembering the place you were at when you heard the song for the first time. On the other hand, semantic musical memory concerns factual musical knowledge, associative or emotional concepts that are not linked to the retrieval of a specific personal experience, for example remembering the author’s name or the original melody of the song (Kerer et al.,
Besides the improved mood one might get from hearing music, listening to music can also improve our memory (Dowling & Tillman, 2013). Before music is stored in our memory, it must be processed and categorized in order for us to recall it later. There seems to be a specialized music module that helps us processing the music. Support for the existence of this module comes from people with selective impairments in music abilities after brain damage (Peretz & Coltheart, 2003). They might be …show more content…
Explicit memory is a conscious, intentional memory while implicit memory is characterized by a lack of conscious awareness (Kerer et al., 2013). Then again, explicit musical memory can be divided into episodic and semantic musical memory. Episodic musical memory is the ability to retrieve spatiotemporal, personal and emotional contexts of the musical experience, for example remembering the place you were at when you heard the song for the first time. On the other hand, semantic musical memory concerns factual musical knowledge, associative or emotional concepts that are not linked to the retrieval of a specific personal experience, for example remembering the author’s name or the original melody of the song (Kerer et al.,