Musical reward across the lifespan

Music is ubiquitous. Despite the fact that most people find music enjoyable, there are individual differences in the degree to which listeners derive pleasure from music. However, there has been little focus on how musical reward may change across the lifespan. Some theories predict that there would...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Aging & mental health 2022-05, Vol.26 (5), p.932-939
Main Authors: Belfi, Amy M., Moreno, Georgina L., Gugliano, Maria, Neill, Claire
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adults
Age
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Aging
Changes
emotion
Emotional factors
Emotional responses
Emotions
Emotions - physiology
Geriatric psychiatry
Humans
Individual differences
Life span
Listeners
Longevity
Music
Music - psychology
musical anhedonia
Older people
Pleasure
Pleasure - physiology
Reinforcement
Reward
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Summary:Music is ubiquitous. Despite the fact that most people find music enjoyable, there are individual differences in the degree to which listeners derive pleasure from music. However, there has been little focus on how musical reward may change across the lifespan. Some theories predict that there would be little change, or even an increase in musical reward across the lifespan, while others suggest that older adults may have decreased capacity for musical reward. Here, we investigated musical reward across the lifespan. Participants consisted of American adults ranging between 20-85 years old (n = 20 participants in each 10-year age bin). Participants in Study 1 completed the Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (BMRQ), which is a multi-dimensional assessment of musical reward. We found a negative correlation between age and BMRQ scores, suggesting decreases in musical reward across the lifespan. When investigating which components were driving this effect, we found that the music seeking subscale was the strongest predictor of age. Participants in Study 2 completed the Aesthetic Experiences in Music Scale (AES-M), which focuses on intense emotional responses to music. In contrast to the BMRQ, we found no relationship between age and scores on the AES-M, suggesting that strong emotional responses to music are consistent across the lifespan. These results have implications for the use of music as a therapeutic tool in older adults. In addition, this work points to the importance of considering age when investigating reward for music and suggests that the ways individuals experience music may change across the lifespan.
ISSN:1360-7863
1364-6915
DOI:10.1080/13607863.2021.1871881