Neuroscience
The source of professional musicians’ creativity could lie in their dreams, report Piero Salzarulo and colleagues at the University of Florence.
They asked 35 professional musicians and 30 non-musical students to complete a record of their dreams and musical activity for 30 days. Over that period, the musicians, who either played an instrument or sang for a living, experienced twice as many dreams featuring music compared with the students (40 vs. 18 per cent of nights).
And 28 per cent of the time, the music that featured in the musicians’ dreams was an original piece. “The occurrence of unknown musical pieces shows that new musical productions could be created in dreams”, the researchers said.
You might say it’s obvious for musicians to dream about music because we often expect the content of our dreams to reflect our waking activities. But actually, past research has shown more complex activities like reading, writing or calculating seldom occur in dreams. The researchers surmised: “This could be an additional argument for the difference between music and the other cognitive skills”.
And moreover, in this study, the likelihood of dreaming of music was not linked to hours of musical activity on the previous day. Instead, frequency of musical dreams was associated with the age at which the musician began their musical instruction. “This finding is in agreement with the notion that the early years of childhood are crucial for establishing the lifelong development of musical skills”, the researchers said.
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Uga, V., Lemut, M.C., Zampi, C., Zilli, I. & Salzarulo, P. (2006). Music in dreams. Consciousness and Cognition, 15, 351-357.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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Neuroscience
Compose new music? In your dreams
The source of professional musicians’ creativity could lie in their dreams, report Piero Salzarulo and colleagues at the University of Florence.They asked 35 professional musicians and 30 non-musical students to complete a record of their dreams and musical activity for 30 days. Over that period, the musicians, who either played an instrument or sang for a living, experienced twice as many dreams featuring music compared with the students (40 vs. 18 per cent of nights).
And 28 per cent of the time, the music that featured in the musicians’ dreams was an original piece. “The occurrence of unknown musical pieces shows that new musical productions could be created in dreams”, the researchers said.
You might say it’s obvious for musicians to dream about music because we often expect the content of our dreams to reflect our waking activities. But actually, past research has shown more complex activities like reading, writing or calculating seldom occur in dreams. The researchers surmised: “This could be an additional argument for the difference between music and the other cognitive skills”.
And moreover, in this study, the likelihood of dreaming of music was not linked to hours of musical activity on the previous day. Instead, frequency of musical dreams was associated with the age at which the musician began their musical instruction. “This finding is in agreement with the notion that the early years of childhood are crucial for establishing the lifelong development of musical skills”, the researchers said.
_________________________________
Uga, V., Lemut, M.C., Zampi, C., Zilli, I. & Salzarulo, P. (2006). Music in dreams. Consciousness and Cognition, 15, 351-357.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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- Dreaming Of The War
Don’t mention this at the World Cup, but interviews conducted in the year 2000 revealed 17.3 per cent of German people who lived through the Second World War were still experiencing war-related dreams 55 years after it ended. Michael Schredl and Edgar...
- "how Sour Sweet Music Is..."
"How sour sweet music is..." Shakespeare wrote in his play Richard II "...when time is broke and no proportion kept!". The musician known to researchers as E.S. can probably sympathise with this quote more than most - she consistently experiences specific...
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What's next? Science Blogging, The Musical? I can see it (and hear it) now... The Music, The Film, A Place Where Dreams Come True. But seriously, Bora Zivkovic, that tireless expert on circadian rhythms and proprietor of A Blog Around The Clock,...
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Daniel Levitin, neuroscientist at McGill University and professional musician, has been in the (science) news a lot lately. He just published This is your brain on music : the science of a human obsession, the New York Times wrote about him a few weeks...