Can Music Activate Our Pleasure System?

By the end of this article you should have the answers to the following questions:

We’ve all listened to the same song on repeat, we’ve all drummed or sung as loud as we could.

Music makes us feel energetic, powerful and inspired but why?

A study from 2017 found that your favorite songs activates the same part of your brain as many addictive substances

Activating our pleasure system

Most drugs stimulate the nucleus accumbens or neck

The neck is your brains main pleasure center so it controls motivation, rewards and enforcement learning.

Try thinking back to when you were in school and you got a good grade on your test.

What’s the first thing you did?

You probably went to tell your parents/guardians.

You instinctively knew they would be proud of you which told you neck to pump your body with feel good hormones like dopamine.

Turns out your favorite songs do the same thing

Researchers tested this by shutting down opioid receptors in the brain.

This technique normally helps people struggling with alcoholism

What researchers discovered was that after losing these receptors people no longer enjoyed their favorite songs

Does that mean that music is an addictive substance?

Not exactly.

Although some people start to crave the way music makes them feel

While music maybe one of the healthiest addictions it’s important to keep any craving under control

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