The popular view that music enhances creativity has been challenged by researchers who say it has the opposite effect.
The popular view that music enhances creativity has been challenged by researchers who say it has the opposite effect.
Psychologists from the University of Central Lancashire, University of Gävle in Sweden and Lancaster University investigated the impact of background music on performance by presenting people with verbal insight problems that are believed to tap creativity.
They found that background music “significantly impaired” people’s ability to complete tasks testing verbal creativity – but there was no effect for background library noise.
For example, a participant was shown three words (e.g., dress, dial, flower), with the requirement being to find a single associated word (in this case “sun”) that can be combined to make a common word or phrase (i.e., sundress, sundial and sunflower).
Read more at Lancaster University
Image: This is a student listening to music (Credit: Lancaster University)
