BEIJING, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- A new study suggests that music may help people bounce back from stress not just by distracting them, but by reshaping how the brain handles stress over time.
The research, led by researchers from the Institute of Psychology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was recently published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
Scientists have long recognized that music can be relaxing, but it remains unclear whether it offers benefits beyond other soothing sounds, when those benefits are most significant, or what changes occur in the brain to produce these effects. To explore this, the researchers conducted two experiments involving 120 healthy young adults.
In the first experiment, participants listened to either relaxing music or calming natural water sounds before or after a stressful mental arithmetic task. Listening to music before the task did not clearly reduce the initial stress response. However, music appeared to be especially helpful during recovery after the stressful event. At that stage, participants who listened to music reported greater improvements in positive mood and faster recovery on several physical measures.
In the second experiment, another group of participants had brain scans while recovering from the same type of stress. The results showed that music changed communication between the auditory cortex, which processes sound, and the insula and thalamus, which are involved in monitoring the body, detecting important signals, and regulating arousal.
These brain changes followed a clear pattern during recovery. Early on, signals from the auditory cortex to the insula became stronger. Later, communication between the insula and thalamus increased, and this was linked to better mood. The researchers also found that as musical tension rose and fell over time, connectivity among these brain regions changed as well. Those patterns were tied to improvements in mood, heart rate, and autonomic balance.
According to Du Yi, a professor at the Institute of Psychology, music is a highly structured signal that unfolds through cycles of anticipation, tension, and resolution. The findings suggest the brain may use this evolving structure as a scaffold to reorganize its stress-regulation networks, helping both mind and body return to a more balanced state.
"The study points to musical tension as an important factor in how music supports stress recovery. It also offers a possible neural framework for designing music-based interventions to support stress resilience in daily life and clinical care," Du said. ■
