Abstract

College students often can be seen listening to music while studying in the library and around campus. Previous research indicates that some instrumental music can be beneficial to a person’s ability to recall information such as words, while lyrical music can have the opposite effect. Further studies have shown students do poorly on reading comprehension tests when listening to popular music than if they were sitting in silence. The current research aimed to look at music listening compared to memorization abilities. Thirty participants from the Lindenwood Participant Pool were asked to memorize two short passages. One passage was given in silence and the other passage was read while listening to the participants’ choice of music. They were then asked to write down as much of the passages they could remember word for word. While no significant results were found in this study, future research could be conducted with a larger sample size while also looking at a person’s preference for studying with or without music.

Recommended Citation

Rounds, Allisha (2012) "The Possible Effects Silence and Music Listening have on Memory," Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal: Vol. 1: Iss. 14, Article 8.
Available at: https://digitalcommons.lindenwood.edu/psych_journals/vol1/iss14/8