Several studies have successfully demonstrated that music can be a very useful tool in various types of treatments. Music as a therapeutic means to assist any type of treatment or recovery of any kind has been associated with better cardiovascular health, relief of chronic pain, improvement of language, and cognitive skills. The musical sphere, therefore, only brings benefits.
Benefits
Music not only adds many benefits to your mental wellbeing, it also develops attention span and encourages imagination and creativity, stimulates concentration skills and short and long-term memory, and develops a sense of order and analysis, facilitates learning, and exercises intelligence.
Starting From An Early Age
Playing a musical instrument, especially from an early age, has benefits that help improve certain cognitive abilities and overcome mental disorders. Studies have found that music training helps children focus their attention, control their emotions, and decrease their anxiety.
According to scientists, musical training induces a greater sensitivity to emotions. It can improve language and cognitive skills in children, both with and without learning disabilities since the same areas of the brain involved in musical perception are also involved in language and reading tasks.
Educating music from childhood is important since they will not only develop their aesthetic sensitivity but also their emotionality, taking advantage of its physiological and psychological benefits. There is a direct relationship between what you hear and how you think or act.
Behavioural Effects
All the elements that music contains constitute various forms and social habits that will influence the way of being of each individual and, even, in their ways of expressing themselves. For example, their way of dressing. However, it is advisable to make good use of all these elements.
Reducing Anxiety
Music also has great effectiveness in reducing anxiety. There is music designed in a way that includes intonations intentionally inducing rhythms for both ears that put the brain waves into a relaxed delta or zeta rhythms. This improves symptoms in anxious patients even more than music without these intonations; listening to music without other distractions (e.g. driving, cooking, talking, or reading) promotes the best benefits.
Research
Various studies have shown that a positive activity, such as musical training, could influence the cerebral cortex. It was revealed that playing an instrument alters the motor areas of the brain because this activity requires control and coordination of movements. The musical practice was also found to influence the thickness of a part of the cortex related to executive function, including working memory, attention control, and planning abilities, and in areas of the brain that play a crucial role in the capacity for self-control and the processing of emotions.
The results have been conclusive that musical instruction can help individuals to prevent mental problems and activate brain regions that act on memory and attention. Benefits such as coordination can also be obtained through musical training, by developing the corpus callosum of the brain, the area that connects the two cerebral hemispheres.