Abstract
Music can reduce stress and anxiety, enhance positive mood, and facilitate social bonding. However, little is known about the role of music and related personal or cultural (individualistic vs. collectivistic) variables in maintaining wellbeing during times of stress and social isolation as imposed by the COVID-19 crisis. In an online questionnaire, administered in 11 countries (Argentina, Brazil, China, Colombia, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, the UK, and USA, N = 5,619), participants rated the relevance of wellbeing goals during the pandemic, and the effectiveness of different activities in obtaining these goals. Music was found to be the most effective activity for three out of five wellbeing goals: enjoyment, venting negative emotions, and self-connection. For diversion, music was equally good as entertainment, while it was second best to create a sense of togetherness, after socialization. This result was evident across different countries and gender, with minor effects of age on specific goals, and a clear effect of the importance of music in people's lives. Cultural effects were generally small and surfaced mainly in the use of music to obtain a sense of togetherness. Interestingly, culture moderated the use of negatively valenced and nostalgic music for those higher in distress.
Highlights
Music is a powerful stimulus that can drive our affective states, express complex and sometimes contradictory emotions, and energize or calm us (Juslin and Västfjäll, 2008; Juslin and Sloboda, 2010)
Our results indicate that music is highly efficient for obtaining most of the wellbeing goals defined in the current study regardless of gender, and only marginally influenced by age and culture
We examined whether people higher in distress chose specific types of music in terms of arousal, valence or nostalgia and whether they felt music was useful in obtaining the goals of Venting negative emotions and Diversion
Summary
Music is a powerful stimulus that can drive our affective states, express complex and sometimes contradictory emotions, and energize or calm us (Juslin and Västfjäll, 2008; Juslin and Sloboda, 2010). Music listening serves multiple goals or objectives with regard to wellbeing. These goals include aesthetic enjoyment, socializing, relieving loneliness, defining self-identity, recalling autobiographical memories, relieving boredom or unpleasant silences, and as a background to obtain optimal mental or physical performance. These goals may, in turn, change across the developmental trajectory, and vary across genders, cultures, personalities, and levels of musical training
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