The therapeutic value of classical music and white noise for mitigating deficits associated with cognitive function, such as the ability to process conflicting information, is nonexistent, a new study has found.
The study was conducted at Monash University and released in Frontiers in Neuroscience.
For the study, 67 college students were instructed to take part in two separate tests either in silence or while listening to classical music or white noise. Both tests were the SCWT and the WCST, known for assessing neuropsychological functions.
According to the findings: “Both the auditory stimuli were played at a similar intensity, thus their dissociable effects may have resulted from differing emotional responses within participants, where white noise, but not music elicited a negative response.”
“Integrated with previous literature, our findings indicate that outside of changes in tempo and valence, classical music does not affect cognitive functions associated with conflict processing, whilst white noise impairs these functions in a manner similar to other stressors, and hence requires further research before its implementation into neuropsychiatric care.”
