Listening to music linked to stress, mood during COVID-19 lockdown

Editor's Note

This study from the University of Vienna, Austria, finds that listening to music in daily life during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown was associated with lower stress and better mood.

This cohort study of 711 adults living in Austria and Italy was conducted between April 1 and May 8, 2020. Participants were prompted by an app on their smartphones to report data 5 times per day for 7 consecutive days, which provided 19,641 data points, including 4,677 listening reports.

Listening to music was associated with lower stress levels and improvements in mood, especially if the music was perceived as happy.

Those with higher levels of chronic stress experienced the most benefit associated with music listening in terms of improved mood.

The findings suggest that listening to music may be a means to modulate stress and mood during psychologically demanding periods of time, the researchers conclude.