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“Our findings reveal that music is not merely a source of entertainment or aesthetic pleasure; it is also a powerful medium that reflects and shapes our moral sensibilities” - Phys.org

Discussion

Mon, 12/04/23

Little was said about the lyrics of certain genres of music. Although immoral lyrics span many genre, there are certain genre that focus on certain values. Thus it would not be surprising that people would listen to music that had lyrics that were in sync with their values. If that caused them to then gravitate toward certain musical styles, that would not be a surprise. On the flip side, if people had a natural preference for certain musical styles and most of the lyrics from those styles had a specific message, it would not be a surprise if they were influenced by that message.

Mon, 12/04/23

For an article that sound like it had some promise, it had surprisingly little to say, with absolutely no details, evidence, etc. presented. The headline and teaser above say almost all of what the article presented, so you can save yourself the time reading it if you haven’t already done so, and click directly on the link to the study.

Interestingly, the study referenced was actually accessible, rather than just an abstract, though I haven’t yet had time to go through it. The article was obviously just a portal to the study, but IMHO, it could have done a lot better job presenting/summarizing the study than it did.

Dave Barnhart

Mon, 12/04/23

Phys.org kind of falls into the ‘research popularizers’ category. They summarize for popular audiences. … my impression.

But the researchers published a detailed piece at Plos One: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0294402

It’s the sort of thing I’d have to spend quite a bit of time on to reach “confident that I mostly understand.” It would be easy to skim, misunderstand, and/or cherry pick bits from to try to prove a point.

I’m not sure we’re on the same page with what “moral values” are or why they picked the ones they did.

Still, I find it pretty fascinating that someone even attempted a study like this.

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

Mon, 12/04/23

Aaron, that’s the study linked in the article. I have skimmed it a bit, but like you, I would need to spend a good bit more time with it to have any kind of reasonable understanding.

And yes, if I can glean any information from it, I also find the idea of this study to be very interesting.

Dave Barnhart