Dopamine plays a role in the enjoyment of music – Lifestyle

A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that there is a connection between dopamine and pleasure experienced by people listening to music.

In this study, researchers from the University of Barcelona, ​​Spain, and the McGill University Neurological Institute in Montreal, Canada, investigated whether dopamine, a neurotransmitter, plays a key role in regulating pleasant experiences. , had a direct impact on feeling of pleasure while listening to music.

In the laboratory, researchers pharmacologically manipulated and analyzed the dopaminergic transmission of 27 participants as they listened to music in three different sessions every week.

In the first session, participants received the precursor dopamine, levodopa, which increases the availability of dopamine in the brain. In the second session, they were given risperidone, a dopamine antagonist, which reduces dopaminergic signaling. Finally, during the third session, participants received a placebo.

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During each of the sessions, the participants, who listened to their favorite songs and ten other singles, were asked to rate their experience of each song in a subjective way, as well as the variation in their level of satisfaction caused by the passage of one song to another. following.

At the same time, researchers measured changes in pleasure and reward responses related to music using electrodermic activity, a very sensitive technique for assessing emotional changes.

The results of the study show that risperidone impairs the participants' ability to feel the chills considered as the physical manifestation of musical pleasure peaks. At the same time, evaluations of participants' emotional responses were higher after the administration of levodopa.

At the same time, the researchers assessed participants' motivation to listen to music by asking how much they would be willing to spend to buy each song. The subjects tested were willing to spend more after administering levodopa than they were when they were taking risperidone. In short, their motivation to listen to music was stronger when their dopaminergic transmission was increased and lower when it was reduced.