Does listening to music at work improve performance and wellbeing?
In this post I share some science backed research into the effect music has on wellbeing and performance.
Listening to music at work has been a life-long habit of mine. Of course, not during video conference calls or during meetings, but whilst doing deep-work. I've always assumed it helped my performance (anecdotally, it does) and mood, but what does the science say?
I'll share a couple of stories, some scientific research and also my current top 34 albums I listen to in a cool graphic. Why 34? No idea, I just didn't count the grids whilst drawing it š
Whilst we're at it - what do you listen to when working? And do you change the music depending on the task at hand (I do)? Or do you prefer silence (read the article to find out why music may actually be making performance worse). How does music make you feel?
As with all research there are conflicts. Some articles claim improvements, some claim no difference. Still, there is plenty we can learn and test in our own life.
And when we think about increasing performance and wellbeing in our company, should we be encouraging everyone to listen to music? Maybe. Maybe not.
Like many people, I use music to soothe my soul, connect with creativity and reduce stress. I use it when working out and I use music to relax. I also like to create music too.
As you can see from the list below (I'm showing my age here as most of the music is old-school), I listen to a variety of different music - typically linked to the task at hand or simply for listening pleasure. We'll jump into how music affects us further in the article.
Mood, health and quality of life
Like many of you, a lot of my work is quite stressful.
Heavy workloads, family commitments, deadlines, difficult people, toxic workplaces, changing marketplace, job uncertainty, personal insecurity etc.
We live in a world where we're encouraged to grind away and be someone who changes the world. Weāre bombarded with advice on how to crush our goals, outwork everyone else and be strong and confident in the process. With social media weāre exposed to other peopleās amazing livesā¦or so they say.
Companies are often asking staff to "do more with less", and despite all of the talk about wellbeing, with well-intentioned HR initiatives, we're burning out in record numbers. (Tottle, 2016).
We are also facing a global depression challenge. The World Health Organisation state that depression is the biggest killer on the planet. (āDepression,ā n.d.).
But, could music help in alleviating some of the stress, low mood and anxiety? Could it help us to be more productive?
Low Mood and Anxiety
A really interesting piece of research (Hsu and Lai, 2004) demonstrated that patients suffering with major depressive disorder, who listened to their own choice of music for two weeks, showed significant improvements in mood (measured using Zungās Depression Scale).
They found it was cumulative, which is to say, the more music listened to over time, the more effective it was.
Idea : Try carving out some time, energy and attention to simply listen to music, on a regular basis. If you're a manager or leader, lead by example. Make a small portion of your day a non-negotiable music-listening time.
Music therapy has also been shown to reduce anxiety in patients pre-operation (Trappe, 2010). The caveat here is that patients who listened to classical or meditation music saw a decrease in anxiety, yet heavy metal or techno was not only ineffective, but actually increased the risk of life-threatening arrhythmias!
Music therapy has also been shown to have a positive effect in the quality of life of the elderly when it comes to life satisfaction, music attitude and self-concept in music. (Vanderark et al., 1983).
Pain
I used to suffer terribly with migraines. Deep, dark, furious migraines that would wipe me out for days. Iāve learned what triggers them for me, so have fewer than ever, but I still get them occasionally.
When I do get a migraine I put on music, which sounds counterintuitive but seems to work. As I lay listening to music, I describe the migraine to myself, in terms of colour, size, intensity and do deep breathing to lessen the pain.
With some medication, a dark room and finding the most comfortable position for my head to rest, it seems to work. The music was a new thing - and it helped.
A meta-analysis (a review of lots of other research) found that music can help to alleviate pain in a medical setting. With a recommendation for medical staff to use music as a complementary approach to alleviate pain (Lee, 2016).
A meta-analysis piece of research demonstrated that any type of music genre had a positive effect on increasing Immunoglobulin A (An antibody). In other words, our immunity increases when listening to music. (Fancourt, D., Ockelford, A., Belai, A., 2014)
Tip : The science seems strong about music being able to relieve stress, anxiety and pain. Consider incorporating listening to music into your life on a regular basis. I get a feeling every tip in this article will say the same thing....let's see as I finish it š
Performance and Productivity
A few years back I was delivering a major keynote at a conference and I was unhappy with the talk. As I paced back and forth in the hotel room the night before, I just couldnāt work out what was wrong. But I knew something didnāt quite work.
When I teach people how to present, I always say that if something doesnāt feel right about the talk, itās not right.
I was beginning to panic. At one point I thought about going home and apologising profusely, but I was in Romania, and that created a logistical challenge I couldnāt face.
I considering going to the bar and drinking to numb the pain - but that way leads down a slippery slope.
Instead, I opened up a binaural beats app on my phone, put one some low-fi beta beats, and found a bench outside in the hotel grounds.
Now, the science isnāt so strong around binaural beats (let me know if you have any scientific research on it), but it worked for me.
My sheer panic and anxiety dropped to a low level sense of irritability. I simply tuned into the environment around me, and focused on the beats in my ears.
I went back to the room, opened the talk, looked through it and asked some critical questions to get to the heart of the matter. It came to me.
I modified the slides, deleted an entire section (this was probably the main problem with the talk - I was trying to cover too many topics) and read through it several times. All the time listening to some relaxing binaural beats.
I slept ok and delivered one of the best talks Iāve ever done. I won best presentation at the conference and that talk has now been delivered all around the world.
The following year I had a similar challenge but this time I put on some old school hip hop - same effect. Music helps me relax and focus. But does it work for others?
Well, the research is mixed.
Firstly, research has found that listening to music through headphones, whilst working does indeed boost productivity. (āMusic in the Workplace Environment and Productivity - ProQuest,ā n.d.).
The authorās actual recommendation, and one I whole heartedly agree with, is to simply provide a good quality pair of headphones for all employees, and encourage them, if they want to, to listen to music whilst they work.
Of course, not everyone will benefit from listening to music, which weāll come to in a bit, but this is a low-cost option.
I worked in a company a few years back that refused to even buy each member of staff a headset with microphone to do video callsā¦. seriously. The staff had to buy their own gear to actually do remote calls for work.
So, as simple as providing a decent set of headphones for each member of the staff sounds, there are some companies that wonāt do this.
āResults indicated that employees in the stereo condition exhibited significant improvements in performance, turnover intentions, organization satisfaction, mood states, and other responses. The mood state of relaxation best explained the relation between stereo use and performance. Finally, employees in relatively simple jobs responded most positively to the stereos.ā (āMusic in the Workplace Environment and Productivity - ProQuest,ā n.d.).
Hereās another good piece of research.
I actually recommend this activity in the Communication Workshop for dealing with nerves and lifting your energy.
Research showed that employees who took a break, and did a little dance to music during that break, performed better in their role. (Hutabarat et al., 2013)
Go dance.
āStretching and Singing Dancing provide a positive influence to the Productivity and Product Quality, but Singing Dancing gives greater influence on Productivity and Product Quality compared with stretching, because Singing Dancing can make workers feel more relaxed in the work, along with flexibility, so that a more positive impact on mood and perception as well as endurance.ā (Hutabarat et al., 2013)
However, in this study, researchers found absolutely no improvement in productivity of workers in a skateboard factory when listening to music. Zero. To be fair, the employees had a favourable attitude towards the music, so you could put this one down to a positive employee engagement moment. But zero performance improvements. (Newman Jr. et al., 1966)
Maybe it's all about the dancing.
This research here demonstrated no increase in sports performance when music was present. They conclude that music is not a factor for increasing performance in runners. (Schwartz et al., 1990)
Tip : Mixed bag when it comes to performance. There were other papers I looked through but didn't cite - and the same outcomes seem prevalent; some saying music does improve performance, some saying music doesn't.
My own personal tip here is to try it. And be aware that some tasks lend themselves to some genres of music better. I explain my own musical choices towards the end of this post.
Learning and Studying
Research has shown that students who listen to music whilst studying completed tasks more quickly and generated more ideas too.
The researchers concluded that music acted as a motivator. They conclude that listening to classical, jazz, ballad and R&B were the best genre choices. (āMusic in the Workplace Environment and Productivity - ProQuest,ā n.d.)
This following piece of research is interesting. It showed that rhythm, not music, was an important factor in memory recall.
In other words, when information was put into a rhythm, with or without music accompanying it, people were able to remember and recall that information better. (Purnell-Webb and Speelman, 2008)
This may explain why poems, rhyming sentences, rhythm in speech, mnemonics, verse, flowing stories etc are an effective form of communication and learning.
And this research demonstrated that children who learn to play a musical instrument have long-term enhancements in visual-spatial, verbal and mathematical performance. Itās never too late to learn an instrument! (Schlaug et al., 2005)
This research is interesting as it showed that there is a difference between introverts and extraverts in cognitive performance when music is introduced. They had 10 introverts in one group, and 10 extraverts in another. They were tasked with reading text and memorising objects. They tested with and without music.
When music was played both the introverts and extraverts had worse recall with music, than in silence, but the introverts were significantly lower indeed. This research suggests, especially for introverts, that studying in silence is a good approach. (Kahar et al., 2024)
Tip : Explore what works for you. I tend to have silence when reading, learning and studying - the crunch part of the 4 step Personal Knowledge Management System. When I write the A3 learning notes though, I do listen to music.
Conclusions
The science is pretty strong towards the positive effects of music on stress, relaxation and dealing with pain. Itās less clear cut when it comes to performance and learning, but there are many studies drawing connections between listening to music and high performance. Equally, there are some that show no improvement at all in performance when listening to music.
It was quite frustrating researching this article. For every paper I found supporting the use of music for performance and learning, I found one that had no conclusive evidence.
But, for those that did support music being a contributing factor, it seems the genre of music matters. A number of papers cited classical, relaxed beats and "soothing" music as the main types to support productivity.
What I do
What follows is my broad approach to work and music.
I listen to music with no lyrics when Iām writing or researching. I sit in silence when deeply studying.
I listen to hip hop to feed my creativity. I listen to artist like The Leaves and Guns & Roses etc to elicit positive memories from the past - kind of like Iām young again!
I listen to classical, jazz, funk or acid jazz when Iām creating learning notes. I love some good dance or drum & bass when I need an energy boost. I listen to rock and heavy metal when I work out. I listen to podcasts or BBC Radio 6 when I commute, or am cooking tea.
I listen to a varied mix of all genres when I want to chill out, zone out and gather some space from a digital world. And I listen to music like Nightmares on Wax, and even The Counting Crows, when I want to drift off for an afternoon nap. And I use lo-fi beats to relieve pain and enter a state of deep stress management.
Music, for me, is a door into another part of my brain. I use it to access spaces in my mind that feel closed off. And with that access comes feelings, emotions and nervous system changes, whether scientifically proven or not - they work for me.
When it comes to the workplace, there seems to be a strong case for encouraging anyone who wants to, to listen to music. It seems to be about direct music to your ears through headphones, and not a general broadcasting of tunes in the office. After all, could a team ever agree on a playlist?
When we were having our house built the builders listened to various radio stations all day - they especially liked the classic hits and quizzes. The painters listened to banging dance music. And the kitchen fitters had Virgin Radio on.
Be careful with music if youāre studying - as per the research on introverts and extraverts.
And of course, there are plenty of other ways to deal with stress, anxiety and depression. If you need some support Iāve included some UK relevant resources below that have helped me when I needed.
And if youāre trying to improve performance there are countless ways to do this - I talk about a lot on this blog.
Plus, for personal performance, thereās some tidy research to suggest that what you wear when performing task makes a big difference! I cover that, and more, in the Communication Super Power Workshop.
Finally, let me know what you listen to when you work, if you do!
Note : As you may see from the drawing of my music list - I also run a weekly newsletter called Creative Soul Projects. It's a behind the scenes creativity newsletter, exploring how to keep creative dreams alive.
Resources
If you need some help with low mood, depression and anxiety here are some resources:
Mind.Org have a big list of helpful resources, support lines and advice.
CALM - Campaign Against Living Miserably
If you enjoyed this content then please consider:
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- Downloading the free ebook 10 Behaviours of effective employees.
- Buying the āTake A Day Offā book for an insightful read and cool artwork.
- Sitting the online communication workshop to develop your super power in work.
P.S - If you need some consulting or coaching support, or fancy an energising talk, then check out the services on offer.
It means a lot. Thank you
Bibliography
Fancourt, D., Ockelford, A., Belai, A., 2014. The psychoneuroimmunological effects of music: A systematic review and a new model. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity 36, 15ā26. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbi.2013.10.014