Music-induced emotion affects what we remember and how clearly

Music can stir emotion, spark memories, and bring people together—but does it also change what we remember? A new study published in The Journal of Neuroscience suggests that the emotional arousal elicited by music after learning can shape whether people remember the gist of an experience or its finer details. The research indicates that increases or decreases in emotional arousal after listening to music influence the balance between general and specific memory in different ways, with potential implications for therapies targeting mood and memory disorders.

Music is often linked to memory and emotion in everyday life. A particular melody can evoke vivid recollections or emotional responses years after an event. This connection has prompted researchers to explore how music might be used as a tool to enhance memory and mood, especially in people with neurological or psychiatric conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease or depression.

Previous studies suggest that music’s influence on memory may be driven by its ability to elicit emotional arousal, which is known to affect how memories are formed and stored. Emotional arousal triggers the release of stress hormones like norepinephrine and cortisol, which influence memory processing in brain regions like the hippocampus and the amygdala. However, the relationship between arousal and memory is complex. High arousal does not always enhance memory and may sometimes result in a trade-off—people may better remember the general theme of an experience but forget the finer details, or vice versa.

The current study was designed to examine how music-induced emotional arousal, occurring after a learning event, influences memory. The researchers were particularly interested in how different levels of arousal—both increases and decreases—affected general versus detailed memory. They also aimed to assess whether features of music, such as familiarity and emotional tone, influenced this process.

“Music seems to hold a special place in memory. Even Alzheimer’s patients can remember music they loved when they were longer, which suggests that music may hold the key to preserving our memories,” said study author Stephanie L. Leal, an assistant professor at UCLA and director of the Neuroscience of Memory, Mood, And Aging Lab.

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The research team recruited 130 undergraduate students, aged 18 to 35, to participate in a lab-based memory study. Participants were randomly assigned to one of six experimental groups. Four of the groups listened to emotionally arousing classical music varying in emotional tone (positive or negative) and familiarity (high or low). A fifth group listened to neutral sounds like white noise or crackling fireplaces, and a sixth group sat in silence. All participants completed a memory task that assessed their ability to remember both general and detailed aspects of visual images.

The memory task had two phases. In the first phase, participants viewed a series of neutral images of household objects and were asked to judge whether each one belonged indoors or outdoors. This task ensured that participants paid attention to the items without being explicitly told they would need to remember them. Following this encoding phase, participants listened to the assigned music, sound, or silence for about 10 minutes.

To assess emotional responses, participants used a standard affect grid both before and after the music or sound condition. This grid allowed them to report their current level of arousal and emotional tone. After a 30-minute delay filled with unrelated questionnaires, participants completed the second phase of the memory task. This time, they were shown images and asked to decide whether each one was new, old (an exact repeat), or similar but not identical to something they had seen earlier.

This task allowed the researchers to separately measure two types of memory: target recognition (for general memory of repeated items) and lure discrimination (for specific memory that can distinguish between similar items). Higher lure discrimination indicates a sharper, more detailed memory.

Music listening increased emotional arousal relative to the control conditions of neutral sounds or silence. This effect was strongest for negative music—regardless of whether it was familiar or unfamiliar—and for unfamiliar positive music. However, not all participants responded to the music in the same way. While the music was rated as emotionally arousing in pilot testing, individual responses varied widely, with some participants reporting increased arousal and others reporting decreases.

Despite these differences in emotional response, the researchers found no clear differences in memory performance across the six experimental groups. This suggested that the type of music or sound alone was not enough to explain memory differences. The researchers then turned to a different strategy: grouping participants based on how their emotional arousal changed after listening to music.

Using a machine learning technique called k-means clustering, they identified three distinct groups among the music participants: those who experienced large increases in arousal, those who showed moderate increases, and those who showed moderate decreases. When memory performance was examined across these groups, a more nuanced picture emerged.

Participants who experienced large increases or moderate decreases in arousal performed better on general memory (target recognition), but worse on specific memory (lure discrimination). In contrast, those who showed a moderate increase in arousal displayed stronger performance on lure discrimination but weaker performance on target recognition.

This suggests that moderate emotional arousal may enhance the brain’s ability to store fine-grained details, possibly by engaging hippocampal mechanisms related to pattern separation. In contrast, both high and low arousal may favor the storage of the broader context or gist of an experience.

“We initially hypothesized that music would enhance memory in general, so finding gist versus detail trade-offs was very interesting,” Leal told PsyPost. “Gist versus detail trade-offs in memory have been found in other emotional contexts, so it makes sense with the broader literature on emotional modulation, but was novel within the music and cognition field.”

When comparing these patterns with the control group, the researchers found that similar arousal patterns in the absence of music did not produce the same memory trade-offs. In other words, music-induced arousal appeared to have a unique impact on how memories were encoded or stabilized, even when the level of arousal was similar to that caused by non-musical stimuli.

“Music doesn’t impact all memory equally – we see evidence of music being able to target memory for the gist or details of an experience,” Leal said. “Furthermore, there are large individual differences in response to music, which can have a big impact on how music intervention may be impactful at improving memory. This is important when thinking about developing personalized music interventions.”

One of the main limitations of this study is that all participants listened to classical music, which may not be equally engaging or emotionally meaningful to everyone. Personal music preferences likely shape emotional responses and could influence how music affects memory. While classical music is commonly used in research, it may not fully capture the range of emotional engagement people experience when listening to their favorite songs.

The study also relied on self-reported emotional arousal, which, while useful, may not fully reflect physiological changes. Future studies could incorporate measures such as heart rate, skin conductance, or brain imaging to provide a more complete picture of how emotional arousal unfolds and interacts with memory processes. Additionally, studying longer-term memory effects, such as testing memory 24 hours or a week later, could clarify whether these music-induced enhancements are short-lived or more durable.

“We plan to utilize personalized music selections in our next study to determine what role a more individualized music approach has on emotional arousal and memory,” Leal said.

The study, “Fine-Tuning the Details: Post-encoding Music Differentially Impacts General and Detailed Memory,” was authored by Kayla R. Clark and Stephanie L. Leal.