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Goopy, J., & MacArthur, S. L. R. (2025). Music learning and school-aged children’s and adolescents’ wellbeing: A scoping review. Research Studies in Music Education. https://doi.org/10.1177/1321103X251323562
There is compelling evidence that music can support young people’s wellbeing, particularly through music listening to and making. In this article we report a systematic review of music learning and wellbeing literature to offer a new perspective on learning music as a wellbeing strategy. In this review, we investigated (a) what definitions and theories of wellbeing have been used; (b) what methodologies have been employed, particularly measurement tools; (c) what learning contexts and participant demographics have been examined; and (d) what is known about music learning and the wellbeing of school-aged children and adolescents. This review was conducted using the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) extension for scoping reviews (PRISMA-ScR) and a protocol was registered. Four hundred and twenty-three sources were retrieved from nine databases, and 30 sources were analyzed after screening. Findings identified that most sources did not adopt a clear definition or theory of wellbeing. Qualitative methods overwhelmingly inform existing knowledge and studies were predominantly situated in Australia and the United Kingdom. All but one source reported that music learning supported wellbeing. Wellbeing outcomes were summarized into three themes (individual, social, and educational) and characteristics of these music programs and approaches were also identified. The review concludes with clear recommendations to direct future research. These include a need for music education scholars to adopt an interdisciplinary approach informed by existing wellbeing knowledge. The field would benefit from developing a quantitative instrument to measure music learning and wellbeing outcomes for use in large-scale studies, including in schools. Future research must closely interrogate the wellbeing outcomes and characteristics of specific music learning activities, how learning music can be a form of wellbeing literacy, and how wellbeing strategies can be integrated into music education.
Li, M. G., Olsen, K. N., & Thompson, W. F. (2025). Cross-cultural biases of emotion perception in music. Brain Sciences, 15(5), 477. https://doi.org/10.3390/brainsci15050477
Objectives: Emotion perception in music is shaped by cultural background, yet the extent of cultural biases remains unclear. This study investigated how Western listeners perceive emotion in music across cultures, focusing on the accuracy and intensity of emotion recognition and the musical features that predict emotion perception. Methods: White-European (Western) listeners from the UK, USA, New Zealand, and Australia (N = 100) listened to 48 ten-second excerpts of Western classical and Chinese traditional bowed-string music that were validated by experts to convey happiness, sadness, agitation, and calmness. After each excerpt, participants rated the familiarity, enjoyment, and perceived intensity of the four emotions. Musical features were computationally extracted for regression analyses. Results: Western listeners experienced Western classical music as more familiar and enjoyable than Chinese music. Happiness and sadness were recognised more accurately in Western classical music, whereas agitation was more accurately identified in Chinese music. The perceived intensity of happiness and sadness was greater for Western classical music; conversely, the perceived intensity of agitation was greater for Chinese music. Furthermore, emotion perception was influenced by both culture-shared (e.g., timbre) and culture-specific (e.g., dynamics) musical features. Conclusions: Our findings reveal clear cultural biases in the way individuals perceive and classify music, highlighting how these biases are shaped by the interaction between cultural familiarity and the emotional and structural qualities of the music. We discuss the possibility that purposeful engagement with music from diverse cultural traditions—especially in educational and therapeutic settings—may cultivate intercultural empathy and an appreciation of the values and aesthetics of other cultures.
Quan, Y., Lo, C. Y., Wolff, L., Wang, J., Olsen, K. N., & Thompson, W. F. (2025). Cognitive benefits of music in aerobic exercise: Evidence from a Bayesian network meta-analysis in adults with mild cognitive impairment. Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics, 105848. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.archger.2025.105848
This article presents a network meta-analysis comparing the effectiveness of aerobic exercise with/without music, and dance interventions on cognitive functions in adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). The results showed that aerobic exercise with music was most effective for global cognition, executive function, and processing speed, while dance was most effective for short-term memory, learning efficiency, and retrieval fluency. This study supports that incorporating music in exercise amplifies the cognitive benefits beyond exercise alone for individuals with MCI. We proposed the “Music Exercise Synergy Model” to explain the synergistic effect of combining music and exercise on cognitive functions. We believe that our research aligns closely with the themes addressed in your newsletter and would be of interest to your audience. Therefore, we kindly request consideration for inclusion in the upcoming issue. Your support in sharing our work with your audience would be immensely appreciated.