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Due to popular demand (well, okay, Sophia expressed polite interest ), I thought I'd post the reading list for my psychology of music seminar I'm teaching this semester. One thing to keep in mind is that the course is titled "The social psychology of music," and so the emphasis is definitely social or interpersonal in nature... there's a lot on cognitive or neurological factors in performing music that I just don't have the time or inclination to get into.

I'm sure there's lots of great topics or readings I've left out. If you have suggestions for improvement, I'd love to hear them. Prepping a course from scratch is just too much work to only use once, so I'm sure I'll be teaching it again in the future.

Oh, and I'm only copying the reading assignments. If you're interested in the rest of the syllabus (paper requirement, dire threats not to plagiarize or turn in papers late, etc.), PM me and I can email you the whole thing.)

Required Readings

Two books are required for this course. They are available at the UK bookstore:

Levitin, D. J. (2007). This is your brain on music: The science of a human obsession. New York: Plume/Penguin.

Sacks, O. (2008). Musicophilia: Tales of music and the brain (revised and expanded version). New York: Vintage.

Week 1– 8/26; Defining music: “The material of music is sound and silence. Integrating these is composing. I have nothing to say and I am saying it.”

–No assigned readings

Week 2–9/2: The psychophysiology of music: If a tree is playing a piano in the forest and nobody is there, does it make a sound?

Levitin: Introduction, chs. 1-3 (pp. 1-110)

Week 3–9/9: The music in your head: Just what the heck is “symphonic metal” anyway?

Levitin: chs. 4-5 (pp. 111-163)

Sacks: chs. 4-6 (pp. 32-92)

Week 4–9/16: “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?”: The practice vs. talent debate

Levitin: ch. 7 (pp. 193-221)

Sacks, ch. 12 (pp. 162-170)

Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. T., & Tesch-Römer, J. C. (1993). The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. Psychological Review, 100, 363-406.

Howe, M. J. A., Davidson, J. W., & Sloboda, J. A. (1998). Innate talents: Reality or myth? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 21, 399-442.

Week 5–9/23: Musical preferences and personality: Could you marry somebody who liked Barry Manilow?

Levitin: ch. 8 (pp. 223-246).

Rentfrow, P. J., & Gosling, S. D. (2003). The do re mi’s of everyday life: The structure and personality correlates of music preferences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84, 1236-1256.

Rentfrow, P. J., & Gosling, S. D. (2005). Message in a ballad: The role of music preferences in interpersonal perception. Psychological Science, 17, 236-242.

North, A. C., Hargreaves, D. J., & Hargreaves, J. J. (2004). Uses of music in everyday life. Music Perception, 22, 41-77.

Week 6–9/30: What is music good for?: The evolutionary basis of music

Levitin: ch. 9 (pp. 247-267)

Fitch, W. T. (2005). The evolution of music in comparative perspective. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1060, 29-49.

Huron, D. (2001). Is music an evolutionary adaptation? Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 930, 43-61.

Week 7–10/7: What else is music good for?: Baby Mozart had to play the piano, not just listen to it

Sacks, chs. 1 & 7 (pp. 3-18 & pp. 95-104)

Trainor, L. J. (2005). Are there critical periods for musical development? Developmental Psychobiology, 46, 262-278.

Steele, K. M., Bass, K. E., & Crook, M. D. (1999). The mystery of the Mozart effect: Failure to replicate. Psychological Science, 10(4), 366-369.

Schellenberg, E. G. (2006). Long-term positive associations between music lessons and IQ. Journal of Educational Psychology, 98, 457-468.

Schellenberg, E. G. (2004). Music lessons enhance IQ. Psychological Science, 15(8), 511-514.

Hyde, K., Lerch, J., Norton, A., Forgeard, M., Winner, E., Evans, A. C., & Schlaug, G. (2009). Musical training shapes structural brain development. The Journal of Neuroscience, 29, 3019-3025.

Week 8 – 10/14: Midterm exam: No assigned readings.

Week 9 – 10/21: Soothing the savage breast: Using music to heal others

Sacks, chs. 16-18 (pp. 232-253); ch. 20 (pp. 270-283); 29 (pp. 371-385)

Mitchell, L. A., MacDonald, R. A. R., & Knussen, C. An investigation of the effect of music and art on pain perception. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 2(3), 162-170.

Gold, C., Solli, H. P., Krüger, V., & Lie, S. A. (2009). Dose-response relationship in music therapy for people with serious mental disorders: Systematic review and meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review, 29, 193-207.

Week 10 – 10/28: “Our experiment in sound was nearly ready to begin”: Using music for behavioral control

Egermann, H., Kopiez, R., & Reuter, C. (2006). Is there an effect of subliminal messages in music on choice behavior? Journal of Articles in Support of the Null Hypothesis, 4(2), 29-42.

North, A. C., MacKenzie, L. C., Law, R. M., & Hargreaves, D. J. (2004). The effects of musical and voice “fit” on responses to advertisements. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 34, 1675-1708.

Carpentier, F. D., Knobloch-Westerwick, S., & Blumhoff, A. (2007). Naughty versus nice: Suggestive pop music influences on perceptions of potential romantic partners. Media Psychology, 9, 1-17.

Cusick, S. G. (2008). “You are in a place that is out of the world...”: Music in the detention camps of the “Global War on Terror.” Journal of the Society for American Music, 2(1), 1-26.

Week 11 – 11/5: A bum rap: Music and violence

Anderson, C. A., Carnagey, N. L., & Eubanks, J. (2003). Exposure to violent media: The effects of songs with violent lyrics on aggressive thoughts and feelings. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(5), 960-971.

Fischer, P., & Greitemeyer, T. (2006). Music and aggression: The impact of sexual-aggressive song lyrics on aggression-related thoughts, emotions, and behavior toward the same and the opposite sex. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 32, 1165-1176.

Anderson, C. A., Berkowitz, L., Donnerstein, E., Huesmann, L. R., Johnson, J. D., Linz, D., Malamuth, N. M., & Wartella, E. (2003). The influence of media violence on youth. Psychology in the Public Interest, 4(3), 81-110.

Savage, J., & Yancey, C. (2008). The effects of media violence exposure on criminal aggression: A meta-analysis. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 35(6), 772-791.

Week 12 – 11/11: Juke box hero: Performance issues

Sacks, ch. 22 (pp. 289-300).

Antonietti, A., Cocomazzi, D., & Iannello, P. (2009). Looking at the audience improves music appreciation. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 33(2), 89-106.

Kenny, D. T., & Osborne, M. S. (2006). Music performance anxiety: New insights from young musicians. Advances in Cognitive Psychology, 2, 103-112.

Moore, D. G., Burland, K., & Davidson, J. W. (2003). The social context of musical success: A developmental account. British Journal of Psychology, 94, 529-549.

Week 13 – 11/18: “Where words fail, music speaks”: Music and emotion

Sacks, chs. 24-28 (pp. 312-370)

Levitin, ch. 6 (pp. 169-192)

Week 14 – 11/25: Thanksgiving: No class.

Week 15 – 12/2: Let’s talk about music

Oral presentations. No assigned readings.

Week 16 – 12/9: Coda

Sacks, chs. 2, 3, 9, 11, 13, 14, 19

ooo - thanks Monica. Nothing like a reading list to get my mouth watering -

Cathy

Monica,
Thank you very much for sharing this! lots of interesting stuff in there!!

Sophia

Thanks for sharing this.

Nice Monica. I read the Levitin book last year, interesting stuff.

Wow, that's great! Thanks, I'm gonna print it off!

What a great course! What an awesome reading list! I want to take the course. OK, Monica, time to stream your course live to your adoring PW audience.

Good God Monica! With a job, kids, houses, piano practice, and 13,000 posts on the forums, when do you have time to do all that reading! Get some sleep woman!!

Monika,

Excellent list!

I note that Daniel Levitin's book features strongly: It seems that his work in Absolute Pitch, in particular, is important.

<<Week 5–9/23: Musical preferences and personality: Could you marry somebody who liked Barry Manilow?>>

No I could not! (but please don't show this to my wife )

SHe's not DOING the reading, she's ASSIGNING the reading to her college class. Big Difference!


I'm joking Monica don't hit me!

What's the breakdown of the students? Do you have a lot of music majors/minors? Did they crosslist it? They should have!

It's a "senior capstone" seminar for psychology majors. It's offered under an "Advanced topics in..." series, so it's not something that got (or even could be) cross-listed with the music department. Though maybe I should've sent a flier over to the music school to have them post it... I'll remember to do that next time! Most of the students have a deep interest and background in music. That makes the discussions a lot of fun, though we do get off topic sometimes. (There was hearty disagreement over whether Led Zeppelin was the best rock group of all time, for example; an interesting topic to be sure but not exactly relevant to the syllabus. )

As someone who owns all of their music- that is a debate my wife would gladly participate.
I on the other hand... do enjoy some of their stuff.

Oooh... and the Robert Plant/Alsion Kraus CD is really good!

I'd think Music majors/minors would be dying to take this as part of their non-music core. I know I would have. But it might have to be tweaked for those who've only had Psych 101 or no pre-reqs.

I would guess that a cross-listed class that had music majors, psych majors, and music ED majors would have wildly interesting discussions with their different perspectives and areas of expertise.

Oh and while I'm planning your future course offerings

If your university is big into inter-disciplinary work and teaching, you should consider teaching or co-teaching (or co-researching!) a performance anxiety class. Cross list between psych/counseling/music. My university thinks interdisciplinary stuff is the best thing since sliced bread. There are limitations and difficulties due to the different beliefs and assumptions of different disciplines but some work well together.

I had a performance anxiety class back in the dark ages that was good for the time (I'm assuming a lot has been learned since then) but was taught just by one of the music faculty on what he'd learned himself and readings he'd done.

Oooooh I'm completely jealous of your students, this looks really cool!

Does your university offer any kind of online, continuing ed classes? I bet if you worked up a version of this class that you could teach online as continuing ed, a bunch of us would sign up!

And... is there any way for people not associated with universities to get copies of articles?

Looks like a really interesting class! I hope you have a blast with it!

Monica,

Your course sounds very interesting. I'm thinking that there will be some highlights from your lectures (overviews, conclusions, topics related to practicing) that would be of interest to many of us. And, given that you are known to be the owner of a high quality recorder, and very experienced at posting audio files to the internet, you might just consider sharing a few clips with us.

BTW, several years ago I read Steven Pinker's book "How the Mind Works", which includes a long section on the adaptation issue. Very interesting, but left me hanging.


Ed

Yes, Pinker is not a favorite among psychologists of music. He basically argued that music was an epiphenomenon with no intrinsic use. Them's fightin' words around here. My own personal belief is that music is too universal not to have adaptive value, and I'm guessing the adaptive value rests in the role music plays in promoting social bonds and maternal-child bonding.

...but that's grist for another thread.

Monica,

Does this course have an extensive list of prerequisites? Capstone courses often do. But if it only requires some of the introductory psychology courses, perhaps it could be made known to music majors. Many of them may have taken a number of psychology courses in their earlier years as they filled out their general education requirements, and some of them may have psychology as a second major or as a minor.

First of all, thanks very much for posting this. It looks like a great course. Second, I can answer the Week 5 question without reservation. Yes. I even let my husband play Barry Manilow at our wedding. My friends sang along, held hands, and swayed!