Music, memory and emotion

Abstract

Because emotions enhance memory processes and music evokes strong emotions, music could be involved in forming memories, either about pieces of music or about episodes and information associated with particular music. A recent study in BMC Neuroscience has given new insights into the role of emotion in musical memory.ud Music has a prominent role in the everyday life of many people. Whether it is for recreation, distraction or mood enhancement, a lot of people listen to music from early in the morning until late at night, especially since the invention of radio and recordings. Because of its near ubiquity, music has been identified as important in the construction of autobiographical memories and thus for making judgments about oneself and others. But which musical pieces do we remember, and how is music related to our memory? This interesting question has as yet received surprisingly little attention in the scientific literature. Several papers [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] have looked at the role of music in memory formation and recall of autobiographical and episodic information, and a recent paper in BMC Neuroscience in particular gives new insights into the role of emotion in musical memory [6]. Collectively, these papers emphasize the enhancing role of music and emotion on memories in various contexts, which I shall focus on in this review