Music-induced emotions activate brain regions involved with processing sound and movements

Music can spark emotion on the listener's face, but scientists discovered they can'see' the type of melody being played when looking at the individual's brain. Using machine learning and functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers at the University of Turku found that the auditory and motor cortex were activated when happy or sad music is played. The auditory cortex processes the acoustic elements, such as rhythm and melody, and the motor cortex could be related to the fact that music inspires feelings of movement. The study also looked at music that induces fear, revealing it correlates with subcortical structures involved with memory, emotion and pleasure. 'Music can induce strong subjective experience of emotions, but it is debated whether these responses engage the same neural circuits as emotions elicited by biologically significant events,' researchers shared in the study published in Oxford Academic.