How Classroom Teachers Can Use the Mozart Effect to Improve Students' Intelligence

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by: Brian SD Scott
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Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2010 Time: 6:26 AM
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The Mozart Effect is a theory based on results from a research study that showed when students who listened to Mozart before taking a spatial reasoning test showed an increase of up to 9 points in their IQ. Although the increase was only for a short period of time, 10 to 15 minutes, it did show improvement. The term was first called this by Alfred A. Tomatis. He used the music the as a listening stimulus to try to negate certain affects deriving from mental disorders. It was then popularized in 1994 in an article in the New York Times.

The science behind the affect is actually quite simple. The researchers believe that intelligence was improved because it shares the same pathways in the brain as processing classical music tones. One needs to understand that the ear and brain are 2 separate entities but combine to create the listening experience. When a sound wave hits the ear it is then sent via electrical impulse to the brain to be processed. Listening to Mozart or any relaxing music seems to warm up the synapses and pathways in the brain.

This allows the information to be processed correctly and more efficiently. Making it possible to remember and put to use more effectively.

Although many people believe that actually listening to Mozart makes you smarter, this is not true. The affects of the music are more related to spatial-temporal tasks involving mental imagery and temporal ordering and not intelligence. However, boosting those traits increases your ability to absorb information. The best results have shown up in children. Some say it's because the brain is still developing and allows for such activity in the brain to go on.

Some scientists believe that the only link this research has anything to do with is the mood and arousal that the music puts you in. Even with their thinking it only proves the theory to have validity. Music affects different people in different ways. The research has been put to use in other fields as well. Some recent tests on epileptic patients have shown a decrease epileptiform activity. Much research is being put into the psychoacoustic field for many different disorders and for many advancements of the human brain. Advancements in this field could lead to some major breakthroughs in the understanding of how the human mind works and how we can make it work for us.

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