Making a Song and Dance About It: The Effectiveness of Teaching Children Vocabulary with Animated Music Videos

Programs that engage young children in movement and song to help them learn are popular but experimental evidence on their impact is sparse. We use an RCT to evaluate the effectiveness of Big Word Club (BWC), a classroom program that uses music and dance videos for 3-5 minutes per day to increase vocabulary. We conducted a field experiment with 818 preschool and kindergarten students in 47 schools in three U.S. states. We find that treated students scored higher on a test of words targeted by the program (0.30 SD) after four months of use and this effect persisted for two months.

This work was supported by J-PAL. This study was registered on the AEA RCT Registry (AEARCTR-0002631) and received approval from the Social and Behavioral Sciences IRB from the University of Chicago (IRB17-1609). We are grateful to the staff at the Behavioral Insights and Parenting Lab, led by Michelle Park Michelini, for invaluable effort in implementing this intervention, and Harkirat Kaur for excellent research assistance. We are grateful to Shane DeRolf for his efforts not only in developing the Big Word Club but also in enthusiastically embracing the evaluation process. We also thank participants at the Advances with Field Experiments and AEFP conferences for helpful comments. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

MARC RIS BibTeΧ

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February 16, 2024

This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies . Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility:

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Music education, support networks, and continuity are key factors regulating adolescents' arts participation, says study

by University of the Arts Helsinki

music

How do young people find their way to music-making? Researchers Anna Kuoppamäki from the University of the Arts Helsinki and Fanny Vilmilä from the Finnish Youth Research Network identified factors that had a significant impact on the formation of the musical life courses of the young people interviewed in their study.

The researchers conclude that among young music-makers, access to music education such as available music tuition or living place; varying support networks including important motivators like family members, peers, or teachers; and continuity of musical activities seemed to be the key factors regulating their arts participation and agency in cultural authorship.

Kuoppamäki and Vilmilä also constructed five musical pathways understood as ongoing processes in which learning may take on varying forms and intensities.

Within the pathways they identified different ways and modes of arts participation—but also the sense of it as one's own mindset connected to both identity formation and to acting musically in the world. The ways of arts participation varied between the pathways. Also, the sense of arts participation alternated and was, in that way, pathway -sensitive.

Extensively supported formal pathway

The interviewees on this pathway started their musical training in early childhood, and their mothers were an important source of inspiration when applying to an extra-curricular music school.

They all participated in several musical activities: learning one or more musical instruments in a music school, participating actively in school music education, singing in a choir in commercial productions, or playing in a pop or jazz band. They all had plans for musical careers.

Kuoppamäki and Vilmilä point out that all these young people received extensive social and economic support from their families and teachers, as well as their music schools, to pursue their musical ambitions.

Self-forged pathway

The interviewees on this pathway started their musical activities in their primary school years. Two of them started to learn an instrument with private teachers. The third one applied to an extra-curricular music school at the age of 9.

According to the researchers, all these young people were learning-oriented. However, in contrast to the first group, their musical pathways were not straightforward. The researchers describe their musical pathways as self-forged.

On the self-forged pathway, arts participation manifested in an ability to make individual choices when authoring one's musical life.

On the other hand, two of the three interviewees expressed how they lacked peers at primary school with whom to share their musical interests. One of them, who had taken private lessons in piano, remembered:

" It was just that no one else was interested in it [classical music]. So, I was a bit different from the others, and they wanted to bully me for that [. . .] at the time it was quite heavy. "

Kuoppamäki and Vilmilä conclude that for the male interviewees on this pathway, the challenges in arts participation came down to a lack of collective meaning-making and a sense of belonging. Their peer groups supported the ideal of hegemonic masculinity in which the arts were not included.

Family and nonformal activity-oriented pathway

The third group took part in daily music-making with their family members already from early childhood . The researchers see this low-profile music-making not just as a way to engage in meaningful relationships within their families but also as an important environment for early-stage musical learning and cultural production as part of everyday life.

For example, one interviewee saw his father as a musical role model and started to play in the same church band:

"I remember how I looked up at him [. . .] how on earth can he play all those different instruments, and I wanted to be able to do it one day, too. And ever since, when at the age of five . . . I began to learn [to play instruments], I started to make my own music as well."

Later in their adolescence, these young people found their way to music-related youth work.

Consequently, for these young people, it was collective endeavors through which cultural participation took place. Moreover, their agency was distinctive in searching out opportunities for music-making and their energetic attitude toward nonformal music activities, the researchers conclude.

Open-access-oriented pathway

A strong self-directiveness in making music was typical for young people on the fourth pathway—even though the families or music teachers were supportive.

Two of the interviewees expressed interest in music at an early age but could not find either the space or activities for sustained music-making. Later, in their adolescence, they both found a musical community at school. The third interviewee of this group started his own rock band with his classmates at the age of 10 and carried on playing.

Research has emphasized the school's role in the formation of bands as social spaces to share musical interests and aspirations and in offering varied resources to explore music. This is evident in one of the interviewee's narrations, "Our music teacher told us that in his point of view, a music classroom is useless if it isn't used outside of classes. [. . .] And I took it like literally. [. . .] He was so jazzed up for the fact that I was always using it [the classroom] so actively."

In addition to school, friendships and the sharing of musical tastes play an important role in young people's musical learning practices in general as was the case also with these interviewees.

Peer-oriented pathway

In contrast to the other pathways, the interviewees on the peer-oriented pathway became interested in music relatively late, during their early adolescence. The defining factor was their involvement with music together with peers.

Kuoppamäki and Vilmilä state that the collective dimension of musical agency was significant throughout the peer-oriented pathway. Together with their peers, they engaged in music-making facilitated through youth work.

Unlike in the other pathways, these adolescents also facilitated opportunities for their peers. According to them, sharing opportunities and skills complemented their own.

The interviewees all experienced their musical skills to be insufficient compared to others who, for example, had made music longer or had had some tuition beyond music classes in school.

Nevertheless, these adolescents did not become discouraged by this feeling of being an underdog. Instead, they actively aimed at developing their musical skills within the settngs they could access.

Young people should be seen as cultural agents, says researcher Anna Kuoppamäki.

Young people as cultural agents and authors

The researchers point out that access to music education is regulated by various social and cultural factors, such as one's knowledge of existing opportunities or types of tuition, gender, or even age. However, not all young people are interested in formal music programs, which tend to offer limited opportunities for individual creative expression and independent art-making.

"Not only does this suggest that institutions need to learn and transform, but that the way young people are perceived in music education also needs to develop toward a broader view in which they are not merely seen as music learners but simultaneously as cultural agents and authors of their own musical lives," they write.

The work is published in the journal Research Studies in Music Education .

Provided by University of the Arts Helsinki

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Performing Music Research: Methods in Music Education, Psychology, and Performance Science

Performing Music Research: Methods in Music Education, Psychology, and Performance Science

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Performing Music Research is a comprehensive guide to research in music performance. It reviews the knowledge and skills needed to critique existing studies in music education, psychology, and performance science, and to design and carry out new investigations. Methodological approaches are highlighted across the book in ways that help aspiring researchers bring precision to their research questions, select methods that are appropriate for addressing their questions, and apply those methods systematically and rigorously. Each chapter contains a study guide, comprising a chapter summary, a list of keywords, and suggestions for further discussion. The book concludes with a resources section, including a glossary and supplementary material to support advanced statistical analysis. The book’s companion website provides information designed to facilitate access to original research and to test knowledge and understanding.

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How technology is reinventing education

Stanford Graduate School of Education Dean Dan Schwartz and other education scholars weigh in on what's next for some of the technology trends taking center stage in the classroom.

research papers about music education

Image credit: Claire Scully

New advances in technology are upending education, from the recent debut of new artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots like ChatGPT to the growing accessibility of virtual-reality tools that expand the boundaries of the classroom. For educators, at the heart of it all is the hope that every learner gets an equal chance to develop the skills they need to succeed. But that promise is not without its pitfalls.

“Technology is a game-changer for education – it offers the prospect of universal access to high-quality learning experiences, and it creates fundamentally new ways of teaching,” said Dan Schwartz, dean of Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE), who is also a professor of educational technology at the GSE and faculty director of the Stanford Accelerator for Learning . “But there are a lot of ways we teach that aren’t great, and a big fear with AI in particular is that we just get more efficient at teaching badly. This is a moment to pay attention, to do things differently.”

For K-12 schools, this year also marks the end of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funding program, which has provided pandemic recovery funds that many districts used to invest in educational software and systems. With these funds running out in September 2024, schools are trying to determine their best use of technology as they face the prospect of diminishing resources.

Here, Schwartz and other Stanford education scholars weigh in on some of the technology trends taking center stage in the classroom this year.

AI in the classroom

In 2023, the big story in technology and education was generative AI, following the introduction of ChatGPT and other chatbots that produce text seemingly written by a human in response to a question or prompt. Educators immediately worried that students would use the chatbot to cheat by trying to pass its writing off as their own. As schools move to adopt policies around students’ use of the tool, many are also beginning to explore potential opportunities – for example, to generate reading assignments or coach students during the writing process.

AI can also help automate tasks like grading and lesson planning, freeing teachers to do the human work that drew them into the profession in the first place, said Victor Lee, an associate professor at the GSE and faculty lead for the AI + Education initiative at the Stanford Accelerator for Learning. “I’m heartened to see some movement toward creating AI tools that make teachers’ lives better – not to replace them, but to give them the time to do the work that only teachers are able to do,” he said. “I hope to see more on that front.”

He also emphasized the need to teach students now to begin questioning and critiquing the development and use of AI. “AI is not going away,” said Lee, who is also director of CRAFT (Classroom-Ready Resources about AI for Teaching), which provides free resources to help teach AI literacy to high school students across subject areas. “We need to teach students how to understand and think critically about this technology.”

Immersive environments

The use of immersive technologies like augmented reality, virtual reality, and mixed reality is also expected to surge in the classroom, especially as new high-profile devices integrating these realities hit the marketplace in 2024.

The educational possibilities now go beyond putting on a headset and experiencing life in a distant location. With new technologies, students can create their own local interactive 360-degree scenarios, using just a cell phone or inexpensive camera and simple online tools.

“This is an area that’s really going to explode over the next couple of years,” said Kristen Pilner Blair, director of research for the Digital Learning initiative at the Stanford Accelerator for Learning, which runs a program exploring the use of virtual field trips to promote learning. “Students can learn about the effects of climate change, say, by virtually experiencing the impact on a particular environment. But they can also become creators, documenting and sharing immersive media that shows the effects where they live.”

Integrating AI into virtual simulations could also soon take the experience to another level, Schwartz said. “If your VR experience brings me to a redwood tree, you could have a window pop up that allows me to ask questions about the tree, and AI can deliver the answers.”

Gamification

Another trend expected to intensify this year is the gamification of learning activities, often featuring dynamic videos with interactive elements to engage and hold students’ attention.

“Gamification is a good motivator, because one key aspect is reward, which is very powerful,” said Schwartz. The downside? Rewards are specific to the activity at hand, which may not extend to learning more generally. “If I get rewarded for doing math in a space-age video game, it doesn’t mean I’m going to be motivated to do math anywhere else.”

Gamification sometimes tries to make “chocolate-covered broccoli,” Schwartz said, by adding art and rewards to make speeded response tasks involving single-answer, factual questions more fun. He hopes to see more creative play patterns that give students points for rethinking an approach or adapting their strategy, rather than only rewarding them for quickly producing a correct response.

Data-gathering and analysis

The growing use of technology in schools is producing massive amounts of data on students’ activities in the classroom and online. “We’re now able to capture moment-to-moment data, every keystroke a kid makes,” said Schwartz – data that can reveal areas of struggle and different learning opportunities, from solving a math problem to approaching a writing assignment.

But outside of research settings, he said, that type of granular data – now owned by tech companies – is more likely used to refine the design of the software than to provide teachers with actionable information.

The promise of personalized learning is being able to generate content aligned with students’ interests and skill levels, and making lessons more accessible for multilingual learners and students with disabilities. Realizing that promise requires that educators can make sense of the data that’s being collected, said Schwartz – and while advances in AI are making it easier to identify patterns and findings, the data also needs to be in a system and form educators can access and analyze for decision-making. Developing a usable infrastructure for that data, Schwartz said, is an important next step.

With the accumulation of student data comes privacy concerns: How is the data being collected? Are there regulations or guidelines around its use in decision-making? What steps are being taken to prevent unauthorized access? In 2023 K-12 schools experienced a rise in cyberattacks, underscoring the need to implement strong systems to safeguard student data.

Technology is “requiring people to check their assumptions about education,” said Schwartz, noting that AI in particular is very efficient at replicating biases and automating the way things have been done in the past, including poor models of instruction. “But it’s also opening up new possibilities for students producing material, and for being able to identify children who are not average so we can customize toward them. It’s an opportunity to think of entirely new ways of teaching – this is the path I hope to see.”

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Music Interventions and Child Development: A Critical Review and Further Directions

Elisabeth dumont.

1 Music in Education, Zuyd University of Applied Science, Maastricht, Netherlands

Elena V. Syurina

2 Health, Ethics and Society, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands

3 Faculty of Science, Athena Institute, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Frans J. M. Feron

4 Social Medicine, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands

Susan van Hooren

5 Healthcare, Zuyd University of Applied Science, Maastricht, Netherlands

Research on the impact of music interventions has indicated positive effects on a variety of skills. These findings suggest musical interventions may have further potential to support educational processes and development of children. This paper reviews the latest evidence on the effect of musical interventions on the development of primary school-aged children. Four electronic databases were searched from January 2010 through June 2016 using music, music instruction, music education, music lesson, music training, development, child, student , and pupil as key words for the search. Two reviewers independently evaluated the studies to determine whether they met the stated inclusion criteria. Studies were compared on study setup, methodological quality, intervention components, outcome variables, and efficacy. A review of these selected studies ( n = 46) suggestive beneficial effects of music intervention on development of children, although clear conclusions cannot be drawn. Possible influencing factors that might contribute to the outcome of intervention are reviewed and recommendations for further research are made.

Introduction

Music interventions are often said to have an influence on motor, language, social, cognitive, and academic abilities (Ho et al., 2003 ; Costa-Giomi, 2004 ; Schellenberg, 2004 ; Forgeard et al., 2008 ; Standley, 2008 ; Jentschke and Koelsch, 2009 ; Southgate and Roscigno, 2009 ; Yazejian and Peisner-Feinberg, 2009 ; Strait et al., 2010 ). Music may play an important role in meeting a child's educational needs as it provides a means of self-expression, giving the child an outlet for feelings and emotions. Music, aside from being a source of enjoyment, is also a means of communication with others (Suthers and Niland, 2007 ). Music may expose the child to challenges and multi-sensory experiences which enhance learning abilities and encourage cognitive development. In particular, music can also engage cognitive functions, such as planning, working memory, inhibition, and flexibility. These functions are known as executive functions (EF). Although there is no consensus on conceptualization, there is agreement on the complexity and the importance of EF for learning and development (Gioia et al., 2000 ). Music education may be a promising tool in improving EF as it activates multiple cortical and subcortical brain areas, including the prefrontal cortex, which is linked to EF (Särkämö et al., 2014 ).

Musical interventions may become an appealing approach for schools that are increasingly facing a challenge of supporting education processes and development of children with varied degrees of learning and behavioral difficulties. However, before an extended use can be introduced into practice, we need to have a clearer, more systematic understanding of the known effects musical interventions have.

The current study builds on the results of previous reviews of literature examining the impact of music training and education including, among others, those of Jaschke et al. ( 2013 ), Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2012 ), Besson et al. ( 2011 ), Maloy and Peterson ( 2014 ), and Miendlarzewska and Trost ( 2014 ). Jaschke et al. ( 2013 ) found mixed evidence of far transfer effects between music education and other cognitive skills. Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2012 ) aimed to review RCTs to investigate the effectiveness of music education on reading skills in children and adolescents with dyslexia but were unable to find such studies. In a meta-analysis, Maloy and Peterson ( 2014 ) concluded that there was a minimal effect of music as an intervention to increase task performance in children and adolescents with ADHD. Miendlarzewska and Trost ( 2014 ) found that musical training in childhood has a positive impact on many cognitive functions and is associated with neuroplastic changes in brain structure and function. The transfer of training from music to speech was evaluated by Besson et al. ( 2011 ), who pointed to positive transfer of training effects from musical expertise to speech processing. When interpreting the results, it is important to take into consideration that these reviews in general yielded mixed results and were limited in their focus: specific skills (Cogo-Moreira et al., 2012 ), a specific developmental domain (Miendlarzewska and Trost, 2014 ), specific designs and age groups (Cogo-Moreira et al., 2012 ; Jaschke et al., 2013 ), or a specific target group (Maloy and Peterson, 2014 ).

Bearing these in mind, the purpose of this article is to provide a comprehensive summary of the existing research in the field by collecting and analyzing the latest evidence on the effect of music interventions across different domains of development of the primary school-aged children. It aims to report on the effectiveness of a broad range of music interventions, describe relevant contextual factors, to evaluate the general level and quality of evidence in the field and to provide implications for future research.

Due to a broad scope of this study, we decided to do a systematic search and a “critical review,” which aims to “extensively research the literature and critically evaluate its quality” (Grant and Booth, 2009 ). Several steps were taken in order to ensure high scientific quality of the work.

Search procedure

The search for relevant articles was conducted via three routes. First, PubMed, EMBASE (Ovid), PsycInfo, and EBESCO databases were systematically searched. The search covered 6 years (January 2010 to June 2016) and the following search terms were included: music, music education, music instruction, music lesson, music training, development, child * , student, pupil . The key-words were combined in various ways using Boolean terms AND and OR. Second, reference lists of the identified relevant systematic reviews and key articles (referenced by more than 1 paper) were examined in order to identify additional studies. The last route included a manual search of the tables of contents of relevant journals: International Journal of Music Education and British Journal of Music Education. A flowchart describing these processes is reported in Figure ​ Figure1 1 .

An external file that holds a picture, illustration, etc.
Object name is fpsyg-08-01694-g0001.jpg

Flow diagram of article identification and inclusion.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Identified studies were considered eligible for inclusion if they met the following a priori defined criteria. The studies had to (a) involve training, teaching, or providing intervention using music; (b) utilize outcome measures targeting child's development; (c) focus on the (pre)school-aged children up to 13 years without physical disabilities; (d) be published in a peer-reviewed journal between January 2010 and June 2016; (e) be written in English. We excluded studies that (a) examined use of music psychotherapy interventions; (b) focused only on imaging techniques, (c) had musical outcomes only; (d) were not based on empirical data: qualitative reviews, commentaries, case studies or studies without an accurate methodological description.

Screening and study selection

Upon removal of the duplicates, the literature search yielded 1,092 results. All identified studies were subjected to multilevel screening, executed independently by two co-authors (ED and EVS). First, the titles and abstracts of identified studies were screened. At this stage, the titles and abstracts that did not meet at least one inclusion criteria (non-English language, commentaries) were omitted. Based on this first screening, 126 potentially relevant articles were obtained as full texts. Next, these articles were further reviewed by ED and EVS independently to determine whether or not they met the stated inclusion criteria. All exclusion decisions were documented. Each reviewer made a selection list, which were then compared. In cases of disagreement, the articles in question were discussed by all co-authors and a consensus decision was made. Our final selection included 46 articles.

Data analysis

Studies that met at least one inclusion criteria, but did not meet any of the exclusion criteria, have been reported according to a list of five variables in order to extract data in a comparable way. The methodological quality of the studies was assessed using the guidelines of the Dutch Institute for Health Care Improvement (CBO). The following elements were evaluated: randomization, allocation concealment, baseline comparability, blinding of participants or providers, blinding of outcome assessors, reporting of attrition rate, the use of intent-to-treat analyses and the use of validated tools. The level of evidence of each study was determined according to the guidelines of Melnyk and Fineout-Overholt ( 2005 ).

The main results of selected studies are reported in Table ​ Table1. 1 . All studies involved participants of 4–13 years-old, but some were not limited to this range: two studies chose a broad age range of 6–25 years [35] and 6–59 years [32]. Sample sizes varied between 10 [1] and 352 [35]. In general, studies employed both genders. One study [40] and one sub-experiment of a study [42] included males only. Although the type of design was not explicitly mentioned in all studies, most studies implemented a(n) (quasi-) experimental, longitudinal, or correlational design. Only three of the 46 studies used a randomized control trial (RCT) [21] [29] [17].

Intervention details for included studies.

The reviewed articles have spawned a broad range of approaches to and considerable heterogeneity in music interventions. In general, music interventions consisted either of structured musical instruction/activities, i.e., use of instruments, singing, moving, listening, improvising, music notation, rhythm training, composing music, instrumental classes, or private instrumental training. Only in several studies, the music intervention was especially designed for the acquisition of specific non-musical skills [10] [11]. Length of the intervention varied across studies, ranging from seven and a half minutes [31] to 11 semesters [43]. Music interventions were mostly provided two or three times per week. In three studies, interventions were delivered on a daily basis [15] [16] [25]. All but two studies [32] [40] used live music as opposed to recorded music. Four studies used a specific pedagogical approach for music instruction: the Orff method, which refers to a way of teaching children about music that engages their mind and body through a mixture of singing, dancing, acting, and the use of percussion instruments or the Kodaly method, in which children are first introduced to concepts of music through experiences such as singing, listening or movement. Only after the child becomes familiar with the concept of music do they learn how to compose it [8] [15] [28] [45]. Interventions were either performed in (small) groups or individual (in case of instrumental training). The authors conducted studies either in the school/classroom environment, where music interventions would be regularly conducted; or used locations outside school i.e., music schools or specific center for music teaching. Information about the person who delivered the music intervention was mentioned in 30 studies. In most studies a professionally trained music teacher was employed. In two other studies, the intervention was delivered by parents/teachers [4] who received training or by trained research assistants [11]. In four studies, the intervention was either computer-based [16] [25] or delivered via CD/radio [32] [40].

The reviewed articles used varied outcome measures affected by music interventions. Outcome measures can be grouped in the following categories: motor skill development, social and emotional development, language, cognitive development, academic performance and other, non-musical, related skills.

Motor skill development

We identified no studies that focused particularly on the association between music training and gross motor skill development. Two studies explored, among others, the beneficial impact of music activity on specific motor skills. Using a non-randomized design, Brodsky and Sulkin ( 2011 ) [1] (which presented results of three experiments) focused on hand-clapping songs. In the first experiment, the association of performance quality of handclapping songs with academic achievement was evaluated among a class of 18 children (mean age 7 years). Two handclapping songs were taught by rote via live demonstration by the second author during a 3-week period and both performance quality and achievement of all 18 children were assessed. Results indicated that children who were more skillful in performing handclapping songs, were also more efficient learners. In a second experiment, the authors measured bimanual rhythmic patting and aural diction in 10 children aged 8–8.5 years, five children who self-reported engagement in handclapping songs activity, and five children from the same classroom who self-reported not to engage in handclapping songs were recruited. Self-reports were confirmed by the second author through observations. The authors found that children who spontaneously engaged in hand clapping songs had an advantage in aural diction and accuracy performance of eye-hand motor sequences. The third experiment took place over 8 weeks. Twenty-four children received classroom handclapping intervention (HCST) while another 27 received the music appreciation guided listening curriculum (MAGL). Children who received HCST were more effective in developing bimanual coupling, writing proficiencies and handwriting compared to children who received MAGL (Brodsky and Sulkin, 2011 [1]). Janzen et al. ( 2014 ) [2] investigated whether formal music training enhances precision in discrete and continuous movements. The study included 32 children enrolled in music classes who had at least 2 h of weekly musical activities. Twenty-five children who were not involved in any musical activity were also included. All were 10–14 years-old. Results showed that musically trained children had a significantly more accurate performance in the discrete movement task compared to controls. Findings suggest performance was positively associated with the number of years of formal music training. Musically trained children also tended to be more precise in the continuous movement task (Janzen et al., 2014 ).

Although reporting positive results, a limitation of above-mentioned, quasi-experimental studies was the lack of randomization. In a sub-experiment of one study only (sub experiment 3) [1], participants were matched socioeconomically and an active control group was included. In the second study of another sub-experiment, performance of the music group was compared to control groups who were not involved in music training [2] or who did not receive any additional activity (sub experiment 2) [1]. Therefore, caution should be used when making inferences about the observed effects of the music interventions on specific motor skills.

Social and emotional development

Social skills.

Four studies reported mixed evidence of the influence of music interventions on social skills. Using a quasi-experimental design, Ritblatt et al. ( 2013 ) [4] found that 55 children, aged 3–5, who received a music intervention program focused on socioemotional skills, demonstrated a positive change in these skills compared to a wait-list control group ( n = 47) who did not receive the music intervention. These changes occurred over the course of a 8-month period. It's important to note that these effects were reported by teachers and not parents. Schellenberg et al. ( 2015 ) [5] investigated whether social benefits were accrued from an existing group music training program that was designed with music pedagogy as its focus in 84 8–9 year-old children. Results showed that children in the music group ( n = 38), who attended schools that incorporated an enhanced group music program into the curriculum, had larger increases in sympathy and prosocial behavior compared to children in the control group ( n = 46), who attended schools without the enhanced music program, but this effect was limited to children who had poor prosocial skills before the lessons began. Evidence from a between-participants study of the effects of joint music making in 48 pairs of 4 year-old children [3] who were randomly assigned either to the music condition (i.e., episode of interactive play with joint music making) or the non-music condition (i.e., episode of interactive play without music), demonstrated an increase in willingness to help one another and to cooperate on a problem-solving task in children in the music condition compared to non-music condition (Kirschner and Tomasello, 2010 ) [3]. However, in an experimental study, Rickard et al. ( 2013 ) [8] assigned 195 5–8 year-old children to either a music education ( n = 122) or a control group ( n = 73) based on the school they were attending. Children receiving a music education received age-specific, specialized music programs on top of the preexisting, general school music program, while children in the control group did not receive these specialized music programs but continued with their regular school music program. The authors found no benefits of the specialized music program on children's social skills compared to children in the control group.

In sum, three studies [3] [4] [5] reported partially positive results, whereas one study [8] reported no effects. One study reporting a beneficial impact of music [3] is of high quality$ i.c. incorporating random assignment to conditions, blinding the outcome assessors and incorporating an active, matched control program without music. The intervention lasted, however, for 20 min. The partially positive findings of Ritblatt et al. ( 2013 ) [4] and Schellenberg et al. ( 2015 ) [5] should be interpreted with caution due to the design used [5], the lack of randomization, the fact the sample may not be representative of the target population (i.c. higher SES and higher educational level) [4] and teacher/parent expectations which may have influenced the results [4]. In the experimental study [8] of Rickard et al. ( 2012 ) [8], reporting no effects of a specialized music program on top of the general school music program, randomization was absent. However, the relatively large sample size, the duration of the study and the inclusion of an active control group are strengths of this study.

Results of above mentioned studies are mixed and demonstrate the need for further research.

Emotional development

Two studies addressed the influence of music on emotional development and reported mixed results. A study of Schellenberg and Mankarious ( 2012 ) [7] assessed 60 children, ranging from 7 to 8 years-old, on a test of emotion comprehension (TEC). The musically trained group included 30 children who had at least 8 months of formal music lessons taken outside the school, whereas the untrained group consisted of 30 children who had no music training outside the school. Musically trained children demonstrated significantly higher TEC scores than the ones without music training. The effect remained even after accounting for demographic variables. However, the link appeared to be a consequence of high level cognitive functioning of the musically trained group. No group differences were present when IQ scores were accounted for. Using an experimental study, Rabinowitch et al. ( 2013 ) [6] tracked 52 children aged 8–11 after they were randomly assigned to either a musical group interaction program ( n = 23), a games group ( n = 8), receiving a similar program without the use of music or a control group ( n = 21), not receiving any special activity. Children in the music group showed an increase in empathy scores on two out of three measures compared to children in the games group and children in the control group.

While both studies reported positive results, the findings of the study of Schellenberg and Mankarious ( 2012 ) [7] turned out to be a related to the level of cognitive functioning of participants in the music group. The experimental study of Rabinowitch et al. ( 2013 ) [6] permits, at least to some extent, for causal inference. The authors used randomization to allocate participants to conditions, thereby reducing the risk of bias from confounding. The small sample size and the fact that the active and the passive control group were merged into one control group before comparison with the music group, should, however, be taken into consideration. Based on findings from both studies, no definitive conclusions can be drawn yet and more research is needed in this area to achieve conclusive results.

Academic self-concept, psychosocial wellbeing, and self-esteem

Three studies reported mixed effects of music on academic self-concept, which refers to the cognitive representation and appraisal of one's own abilities in academic performance (Degé et al., 2014 ), psychosocial wellbeing and self-esteem, which describes one's overall sense of self-worth. In a correlational study, Degé et al. ( 2014 ) [9] revealed that duration of music lessons was positively associated with academic self-concept in 92 12–14 year-old children, even after controlling for demographic variables and IQ. In a 3 year experimental study, Rickard et al. ( 2013 ) [8] showed that increase in school-based music lessons prevented a decline in global self-esteem measures experienced by the control group in both the younger and older cohorts across the first year of the study. However, effect sizes were generally modest in the second year. In another study, Rickard et al. ( 2012 ) [42] investigated the effect of increasing existing music education (study 1) and the effect of introducing a novel high-quality music education program (study two) on various psychosocial measures in 111 10–13 year-old children (all males). One hundred eleven 10–13 year-old children in study one were pseudo-randomly assigned to additional music classes ( n = 47), art classes ( n = 27), or drama classes ( n = 37). One hundred six children in study two (mean age 131.07 months) were randomly allocated to a music group ( n = 38), a drama group ( n = 37) or control group, receiving no program ( n = 31). No significant effects were found.

Degé et al. ( 2014 ) [9], using a correlational design, was the only one reporting positive results. However, these results do not allow for any conclusions to be drawn about causality. Two experimental studies of Rickard et al. ( 2012 ) [8] [42] found modest effects and no effects, respectively music interventions on top of the preexisting school music education. The (relatively) large sample sizes [8] [42] and the duration of one the studies [8] can be considered as strengths. Both studies, did not, however, randomize participants to the intervention or control groups. In one of the two experimental studies [42], active control groups were included, who continued their regular school music program. The other study [8] included both passive and active control groups, which better allowed for comparison of the increased music education.

In summary, although one study reported positive correlations, two studies suggest little or no beneficial effect. Further research is needed to clarify whether music can positively impact self-concept, self-esteem, and psychosocial wellbeing.

Studies that link music intervention to language acquisition can be clustered into two groups: (1) focus on phonological awareness and auditory processing and (2) reading.

Phonological awareness and auditory processing

Several studies assessed the influence of music on auditory and phonological skills with mixed findings. Some suggest that musical activities have a beneficial effect on these skills. Using a descriptive-comparative design, Escalda et al. ( 2011 ) [12] examined the relationship between musical experience, auditory processing abilities and phonological awareness skills of 56 five year-old children. Results showed that 26 children, with musical experience, performed significantly better on auditory processing and phonological awareness than 30 children without musical experience. In an exploratory study, Moritz et al. ( 2013 ) [15] investigated whether musical activity could enhance the acquisition of reading skill, potentially before formal reading instructions began in 30 children (mean age 5.6 years). Children in the music group ( n = 15) received daily 45 min music lessons whereas children in the control group ( n = 15) received weekly 35-min music lessons. Correlational results showed that rhythm ability was related to phonological segmentation skills at the beginning of kindergarten and that end-of-year phonological awareness skills of children who received daily music lessons were better than skills of children in the control group who received music lessons once a week. Using a pragmatic RCT, Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21] included 235 participants with reading problems, aged 8–10 years, in 10 schools, to compare the effectiveness of music education for the improvement of among other, reading skills. Five schools were randomly chosen to incorporate music classes ( n = 114) and five schools, who were not encouraged to offer musical activities, served as controls ( n = 121). There was no improvement in phonological awareness when comparing the two groups. Flaugnacco et al. ( 2015 ) [17], also using an RCT, pseudo-randomly assigned 8–11 year-old dyslexic children to a music group ( n = 24) or a painting group ( n = 24). Both groups also received conventional rehabilitation program. After 7 months of training, the music group outperformed the painting group in tasks assessing rhythmic abilities and phonological awareness. Using a pretest/training/posttest design, Moreno et al. ( 2011b ) [16] focused on the effects of an intensive computerized training in music or visual arts on pre-literacy skills in 60 4–6 year-old children, who were pseudo-randomly assigned to the music or visual arts condition. They reported comparable improvements in both groups in rhyme awareness and in ability to map unfamiliar symbols to known words. However, when the two groups were statistically equated at pretest, the magnitude of improvement was found to be larger in the music group. Herrera et al. ( 2011 ) [13] on the other hand, used a 2 year pretest-posttest study in which 97 children (mean age 4.5 years) at two preschools were allocated following stratified randomization procedures into a group that received phonological training with music ( n = 32), a group that received phonological training with no music ( n = 34) and a control group who did not receive any specialized training ( n = 31). Phonological training was effective regardless of whether it included music and whether the children were foreign Spanish speakers or native speakers. Both experimental treatment groups outperformed the control group in the posttests on phonological awareness tasks and speed in naming objects. However, the phonological training with music group outperformed the phonological training without music group on phonological awareness of ending sounds. In general, the foreign Spanish speakers were significantly slower in the naming task than their Spanish counterparts, those who had participated in the training with musical activities outperformed their peers in the control group by the end of the treatment. Bhide et al. ( 2013 ) [10] compared the effects of a musical intervention for poor readers ( n = 10) with a software intervention of known beneficial effects based on rhyme training and phoneme-grapheme learning ( n = 9) in 6–7 year-old children, all of them identified by their class teachers as struggling readers. The authors found that both interventions were equally effective for literacy acquisition and phonological skills. Habib et al. ( 2016 ) [18] examined the effectiveness of a specially-designed Cognitivo-musical training (CMT) in two studies. In study one, 12 children with a diagnosis of severe dyslexia (mean age 10.7 years) received daily 6 h of CMT on 3 consecutive days while 22 reading-age matched normal-reading children (30 months younger on average) served as controls, receiving no CMT. The authors found that dyslexic children were impaired in the identification test of categorical perception, but their performance reached the level of control children after 3 days of CMT. Significant improvement in performance of dyslexic children was also noticed in the syllabic lengthening task. In study two, 12 dyslexic children, grouped according to the severity of their problems received CMT training sessions at school. The 3-h weekly sessions were provided over a period of 6 weeks. Results showed a positive influence of the CMT program on categorical perception and the temporal aspects of speech processing. Also, additional improvements in auditory attention, phonological awareness (syllable fusion) were found. Fonseca-Mora et al. ( 2015 ) [14], using a pre-post comparison design, tested the efficacy of a phonological training program aimed at improving early reading skills in 7–8 year-old Spanish children learning English as a foreign language in three groups: an experimental group with phonological non-musical intervention ( n = 22), an experimental group with musical intervention ( n = 18) and a control group receiving the traditional teaching program ( n = 23). The results clearly pointed to the beneficial effects of the phonological teaching approach, but the further impact of the music support was not demonstrated. In a longitudinal, experimental study, Degé and Schwarzer ( 2011 ) [11] investigated the effect of a music program on phonological awareness in preschoolers. Forty-one children (mean age 5.6 years) were randomly assigned to a music program ( n = 13), a phonological skills program ( n = 13), or a sport group ( n = 14). Results indicated that 26 children who followed either the music program or the phonological program significantly improved in phonological awareness of large phonological units (words) compared to the sport group who received no intervention. All three groups showed similar development in phonological awareness of small phonological units.

Of the two RCTs reviewed, one found beneficial effects of a music intervention on phonological awareness [17] while the other found no effects [21]. Two experimental studies [11] [13], using (stratified) randomization and including two active control groups [11] and an active and passive control group [13], respectively, reported no beneficial effects of music. Of the four studies that used a quasi-experimental design without randomization, two studies, including an active [10] or both an active and passive control group [14], also found no benefits of music interventions One out of these four studies, reporting positive results, used pseudo-random allocation, included an active control group and blinded outcome assessors [16]. Another study, also describing positive results, matched participants, but did include a passive control group only [18]. Positive results were also reported by two correlational studies [12] [15]. However, these results do not allow for any conclusions to be drawn about causality. Although findings suggest music can positively affect phonological awareness and auditory processing in some situations, clear conclusions cannot be drawn.

Eight studies addressed the association between music-related activities and a range of reading skills with inconsistent findings. The results of the study of Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21] indicated no improvement in word accuracy, in-text accuracy and non-word accuracy of children in the music intervention schools compared to the children in control ones. In contrast, the RCT results of Flaugnacco et al. ( 2015 ) [17] showed better performance of the music group on reading skills in comparison to the control group. Using an experimental design, Bonacina et al. ( 2015 ) [20] randomly assigned 11–14 year-old children to a computer-assisted, rhythmic reading training (RRT) ( n = 14) or a control group ( n = 14), for which no specific activity addressed to improve reading skills was carried out. Results indicated that RRT had a positive effect on both reading speed and accuracy. The effect of RRT seemed to be specifically on reading skills, as no difference in rhythm perception between the two groups was found. Moritz et al. ( 2013 ) [15] found that kindergarteners' rhythm ability was significantly correlated to their phonological awareness and basic word identification skills in second grade. Using a longitudinal design, Slater et al. ( 2014 ) [22] compared reading ability of 42 low-income, Spanish-English bilingual children aged 6-to-9, pseudo-randomly assigned to a group music instruction program outside school or a waiting list control group. Twenty-three children in the music group maintained their age-normed performance on the composite reading measure after 1 year, whereas the performance of 19 children in the matched control group deteriorated over the same period of time, consistent with expected declines in this population. Rautenberg ( 2013 ) [23], in an experimental study, measured the correlations between musical skills and decoding skills and the effects of musical training on word-level reading abilities. One hundred fifty-nine seven year-old children were randomly allocated to a special music training program ( n = 33), a visual arts training program ( n = 41), or no training program for the period of the study ( n = 85). Results showed the special music training had a significant effect on reading accuracy in word reading. Additionally, positive correlations were found between rhythmical ability and decoding skills. Tonal skills were not correlated with reading skills. In a correlational study of Corrigall and Trainor ( 2011 ) [19], it was shown that duration of music training (i.e., the number of years of training on their primary instrument, plus the number of years of training on any additional instruments) was associated with reading comprehension, but not with word decoding among 46 6–9 year-olds. The findings are in contrast to a longitudinal study from Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35] which revealed that practicing a musical instrument was not associated with reading comprehension.

Of the eight studies measuring the effects on reading, two studies used an RCT design with pseudo randomization [17] [21] and blinded outcome assessors [17]. Their findings are contradictory; Flaugnacco et al. ( 2015 ) [17] found a positive influence of music, whereas the results of Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21] indicated no effect. Results of two studies that used an experimental design with randomization [20] [23] illustrated potential benefits of a music training program. Of these two studies, one included a passive control group, offering no music training program [20] while the other included both a passive and active control group [23], allowing for a more comprehensive comparison. The results of the longitudinal study of Slater et al. ( 2015 ) [46] also point to beneficial effects. However, an active control group could not be included. (Partially) positive correlations were shown by two studies [15] [19]. However, correlational studies do not allow for causal inferences. In another longitudinal study [35], participants were compared to themselves. Attrition rate and practice effects might, however, have influenced the results.

As results of above-mentioned studies are both positive and negative, findings in this area are inconclusive.

Cognitive development

In this review, studies focusing on the effects of music on children's cognitive abilities were subdivided into three categories, reflecting different aspects of cognitive development: (1) intelligence, (2) memory, and (3) attention and other executive function skills.

Intelligence

Several studies have explored the effects of music intervention on intelligence. Results from these studies suggest little or no beneficial effects. In an experimental design, Kaviani et al. ( 2014 ) [28] randomly allocated 60 5–6 year-old children to two groups, the experimental group receiving Orff music lessons and the other (matched for age-, sex-, and mother's educational level) receiving no lessons The authors demonstrated that after participating in the Orff music program for 3 months, children had significantly higher scores on the visual abstract reasoning, verbal reasoning and short term memory subscales of the Stanford—Binet Intelligence Scale compared to children, who did not receive any musical lessons. Schellenberg ( 2011 ) [24] and Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35] also reported positive associations between, respectively, music training and IQ and music training and non-verbal reasoning. In a longitudinal study, Moreno et al. ( 2011a ) [25] used two subtests of the WPSI III (vocabulary and block design) to examine the influence of two interactive computerized training programs (music and visual arts) on, among other skills, verbal and spatial intelligence in 64 4–6 year-old children who were pseudo-randomly allocated to one of the two conditions. They found that children who participated in a computerized music training program showed enhanced performance on the measure of vocabulary knowledge. Not in line with above mentioned findings is the study of Mehr et al. ( 2013 ) [29]. They conducted an RCT to investigate the effects of parent-child music education on specific cognitive skills in preschool children. In experiment one, four-year-old children were randomly assigned to a music group ( n = 15) or a visual arts group ( n = 14). In experiment two, 23 children were randomly allocated to a music group and 22 children to a control group who did not receive music classes. Analyses with a combined music group ( n = 38), the visual arts group and the control group revealed no significant effects on spatial-navigational reasoning, visual form analysis, numerical discrimination, and receptive vocabulary. Rickard et al. ( 2012 ) [42] failed to find an effect of increased classroom based music education on various cognitive measures. Bugos and Jacobs ( 2012 ) [26] evaluated the effects of a composition program, Composers in Public Schools (CiPS), on cognitive skills among 28 sixth-graders who were assigned to an experimental group ( n = 15), receiving the CiPS program or a control group ( n = 13), not participating in any musical courses. Results showed enhanced performance in arithmetic scores of the WISC-IV for the experimental group compared to the control group. No effect was found for vocabulary performance. Due to a relatively large variation in scores, enhancements for digit coding and symbol search subtests were not significant.

Only one out of the seven studies measuring the effects of music on intelligence, employed an RCT design including an active as well as a passive control group [29], which permits causal inferences to be made. No significant effects were found in that particular study. The two experimental studies reviewed [28] [42] yielded mixed results. While both used randomization [28] [sub experiment 2, 42], only one study, reporting no effect, included an active control group [42]. The remaining four studies, employed a quasi-experimental (longitudinal) design [24] [25] [26] or longitudinal developmental design [35], showed positive or partially positive effects. However, only one out of these four studies used pseudo-randomized group assignment, blinded outcome assessors and included an active control group. Schellenberg ( 2011 ) [24] and Bugos and Jacobs ( 2012 ) [26] both included a passive control group. Neither study matched participants on baseline variables. Despite the large sample size and duration of the study, caution is needed in interpreting findings of Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35], due to attrition and the possible influence of practice effects.

A number of studies looked specifically at aspects of memory with mixed results. Degé et al. ( 2011 ) [31] demonstrated in a non-randomized, longitudinal design that after 2 years of extended music curriculum (ECM) training, short-term visual, and auditory memory scores for 16 9–11 year-old children, attending ECM training, had improved significantly, whereas no such increase was found in 25 children who did not attend ECM training. Roden et al. ( 2012 ) [33] conducted a quasi-experimental study where participants were allocated to a music program, a science program or a control group. Results showed that 25 children (mean age 7.73 years), who took part in a school-based music program, outperformed 25 children receiving extended natural science training and 23 children in a control group receiving no additional training, on verbal memory tasks. The authors failed to show a link between type of program and visual memory. Brodsky and Sulkin ( 2011 ) [1] reported positive effects of classroom handclapping intervention (HCST) on verbal memory. Results of a longitudinal study by Rickard et al. ( 2010 ) [30] showed significant enhancement of verbal learning and immediate verbal recall scores in 82 children (mean age 8.62 years) after ~1 year, but not 2 years after non-random allocation to an increased classroom-based instrumental music training, compared to 68 children (mean age 8.79 years), who did not receive training. In an experimental design, Martens et al. ( 2011 ) [32] focused on the effect of musical experience on verbal memory in 38 individuals with Williams syndrome, aged 6–59 years. Participants who had participated in formal music lessons scored significantly better on a verbal long-term memory task when the stimuli were sung than when they were spoken in comparison to those who did not have formal lessons, showing no benefit for either sung or spoken condition. Short-term memory did not appear to be affected by musical experience.

The five studies reviewed yielded mixed results. One experimental study [32] showed improved performance of participants who had participated in formal music lessons. However, generalizability of findings is low by including only participants with Williams syndrome, making the participants a non-representative sample. The remaining four studies, reporting positive or partially positive results, employed quasi-experimental (longitudinal) designs [1] [30] [31] [33]. However, in none of these four studies, participants were randomized or matched on potentially influencing variables, decreasing validity of findings. Blinded outcome assessors were used in one study [30]. Two out of the four studies included an active control group [1] or both an active and passive control group [33], allowing for a more detailed comparison. Although studies suggest potential benefits, the methodological limitations do not allow clear conclusions to be drawn about the effect of music and the part(s) of memory of which music can have an effect on.

Attention and other EF skills

The impact of music interventions on attention and several executive function skills was reported in seven studies with mixed evidence. One study of 102 7–12 year-olds Khalil et al. ( 2013 ) [37] found that, those, who were able to synchronize to a driving beat (in the context of a music class), were more attentive, showed less ADHD-like behaviors (rated by teachers) and performed better on an attention control task, in comparison to those who were less capable of synchronizing. Positive results have also been shown by Moreno et al. ( 2011a ) [25], who reported enhanced performance on accuracy on a go/no-go task. Using a cross-sectional design, Zuk et al. ( 2014 ) [38] assessed (among other participants) 27 children (mean age 10 years) on a range of EF tasks. Fifteen instrumentally trained children, who started training on average at 5 years and had been studying their instruments on average 5.2 years, demonstrated heightened performance on coding, cognitive flexibility and processing speed tasks in comparison with 12 children without musical training outside the requirements of the general music curriculum in school. In contrast, Roden et al. ( 2014 ) [27], using a quasi-experimental design, investigated, among other skills, the effects of music lessons on processing speed abilities and visual attention in 7–8 year-old children over a period of 18 months. In the study, 345 children were assigned to the music training group ( n = 192) or the natural science training group ( n = 153). Children in the music group showed significant increases in information processing speed from T2 to T3. However, the level of significance was only associated with a small effect size. Although both groups improved their visual attention scores over time, these increases were stronger from T1 to T2 and T2 to T3 in children with natural science training as compared to children with music training. In a quasi-experimental study, Schellenberg ( 2011 ) [24] found that, with the exception of digit span, music training was independent of performance on phonological fluency, inhibition, problem solving, and planning and mental flexibility and rule switching. Bugos and Jacobs ( 2012 ) [26] found no effect of participation in a 4-month composition program on verbal fluency. Using an intervention design, Janus et al. ( 2016 ) [39] pseudo-randomly assigned 57 4–6 year-old children (matched on age and cognitive scores) to a 20-day music training ( n = 28) or conversational French training program ( n = 29) to compare the effects on executive control abilities. The one training-specific outcome found was that children in the French group showed broader improvement in visual search than children in the music program. For verbal fluency, grammatical judgement and visual search, all children performed significantly better after training.

Several studies suggested music training may improve various aspects of working memory. In one quasi-experimental, longitudinal study (Roden et al., 2014 ) [34], examined working memory performance in 25 7–10 year-old children who participated in a classroom-based, extended instrumental music training program and 25 children who participated in an extended science training program. Results showed significant gains in two out of three components of working memory performance in children who followed the music program for one-and-a-half-years in comparison to children who took part in the science training group. Positive associations between musical practice and working memory were also reported by Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35] and Zuk et al. ( 2014 ) [38]. Portowitz et al. ( 2014 ) [36] reported a significant enhancement in working memory scores in 62 9–10 year-old children after a 4-month participation in the (computerized) In Harmony program compared to 22 controls who did not participate in this program. The results of the study of Janus et al. ( 2016 ) [39] showed no effect of a music training program on spatial working memory.

The seven studies reviewed yielded mixed results of the influence of music interventions on attention and other EF skills. Positive correlations were shown by one study [37]. However, correlational studies do not allow for causal inferences. The remaining six studies were quasi-experimental (longitudinal) without randomization [24] [25] [26] [27] [38] [39]. Two of these six studies, reporting positive results, used pseudo random allocation of participants to groups [25] or matched participants on potentially confounding variables [38] but only one included an active control group [25]. Two other studies reported mixed and modest results, respectively [27] [24]. The sample size and the inclusion of an active control group can be considered as strength of one of them [27]. Of the remaining two studies [26] [39], reporting no evidence of beneficial effects of music, only one used blinded outcome assessors, pseudo randomization, and included an active control group [39]. Regarding working memory, there seems to be a hint of a positive influence of music based on the results of five studies [34] [35] [36] [38] [39]. However, studies were quasi-experimental (longitudinal) without randomization [34] [36] [38] [39] or longitudinal developmental [35]. Only three out of the five used pseudo random allocation [39] or matched participants on potentially confounding variables [36] [38]. An active control group was included by two out these five studies [39] [34], reporting no effects and mixed effects, respectively. The three other studies, all reporting positive findings, included a passive control group [36] [38] or compared the participants to themselves [35].

Although part of the evidence points to potential benefits, more research is needed to determine whether music can positively impact these skills.

Academic performance

Studies exploring the effect of music on academic performance were subdivide into four categories: (1) school readiness, (2) classroom behavior and academic skills and (3) language, and (4) mathematics.

School readiness

One study focused, among other skills, on preschool children's school-readiness skills. The results of a quasi-experimental study of Ritblatt et al. ( 2013 ) [4] showed that participation in a music program had a positive effect on promoting a positive approach to learning. No effect was found for promoting academic skills.

Methodological limitations of this study are the lack over control over assignments of participants to conditions and the fact the sample may not be representative of the population as whole (i.c. higher SES and higher educational level), creating threats to validity. Information about the blinding of outcome assessors was not provided. The intervention was provided by trained teachers and parents, whose expectations may have influenced outcomes. Taking the limitations into account and the fact that the findings are based on one study only, accuracy and direction of the results should be interpreted with caution.

Classroom behavior and academic skills

There is no evidence that music can affect classroom behavior and academic skills. Pelham et al. ( 2011 ) [40] followed up 41 boys with ADHD and 26 normal comparison boys, who had never been referred for treatment of behavior problems (mean age 9 years) to examine the effects of music and video on classroom behavior and performance. Three distractor conditions (music, video, no-distractor) were randomly introduced for 24 days, varying on a daily basis (8 days in each distractor condition). Neither boys with ADHD or the control group were significantly distracted by music. Within the ADHD group, there were, however, considerable differences in response to the music such that some were adversely affected and others benefited relative to no-distractor. This study included males only, thereby eliminating a potential source of variability. Except for gender, participants were, however, not matched on any other variable. Outcome assessors were not blinded and the distractor conditions and no-distractor conditions may have been not much different. The accuracy and direction of the results should be interpreted with caution as findings are based on one study only.

Several studies have explored the association between a music intervention or music training and performance on (specific) language skills respectively, with contradictory findings. With regard to first language skills, results of an RCT by Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21] showed positive growing slopes in Portuguese language in the children who completed a 5-month music education program in comparison to the control children. Findings were in contrast to the results of Yang et al. ( 2014 ) [43] who, using a non-randomized, longitudinal design, examined the relation between long-term music training and, among other skills, academic development of Chinese language among 250 Chinese elementary school students (mean age 78 months). Children who took part in formal music training out of school around the beginning of semester three, were categorized as musician children ( n = 77) whereas the remaining children, who had not received formal music training throughout this study, were categorized as non-musician children ( n = 173). Music training was not related to the enhancement of performance on Chinese language.

Regarding second language abilities, Swaminathan and Gopinath ( 2013 ) [44] explored second-language abilities of musically trained children ( n = 37)(mean age 100.55 months), who reported at least 3 months of music training and speaking a language other than English at home, and untrained children ( n = 39)(mean age 98.89 months) and found that the musically trained children (mean length of training 17.63 months) performed significantly better on the tests of comprehension and vocabulary compared to their untrained counterparts. The advantage persisted even when the trained group only consisted of participants trained in Indian Classical music, indicating that the English L2 advantage was not merely because of an increased opportunity to learn new words from songs as Indian Classical music is written in Indian languages. Positive findings were also reported by Yang et al. ( 2014 ) [43], who found that musician children outperformed non-musician children on second language development.

Two studies [21] [43] reported contradictory results on the potential benefit of music on first language development. However, only findings from Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21], conducting an RCT, allow for conclusions to be drawn about causality. Although the duration and sample size of Yang et al. ( 2014 ) [43] can be considered as strengths, participants were not randomized and a passive control was included. Another two studies reported positive results on second language development [43] [44]. Both studies made a comparison of the music group with a control group, who had no previous musical training. However, only one study [44] controlled for several baseline variables and used blinded outcome assessors, thereby increasing the validity of their findings.

Mathematics

Four studies have explored the effects of music on mathematics. A longitudinal study of Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35] yielded a positive association between music training (i.e., the number of hours per week of practice on instruments played) and performance on mathematics. Cogo-Moreira et al. ( 2013 ) [21] also observed positive growing slopes in math grades. In Yang et al's ( 2014 ) [43] study, however, music training was not related to performance on mathematics. Courey et al. ( 2012 ) [41] examined the efficacy of a music intervention aimed to teach fractions to third graders using a quasi-experimental design. Sixty-seven 8–11 year-olds were assigned by class to either a 6-week academic music intervention, administered during regularly scheduled mathematics instruction, or continued their regular mathematics instruction with their classroom teacher. The experimental group outperformed the comparison group on music notation knowledge and the mathematical fraction completion test (i.e., not previously introduced and improper fractions). No significant group differences were found on the mathematical fraction concept test.

The four studies reviewed yielded mixed results. One RCT [21] reported positive results. The remaining three studies were (longitudinal) quasi-experimental without randomization [41] [43] and longitudinal developmental [35]. Of these three studies, one found a positive association [35], one found partial positive results [41], and one found no relation [43]. Only one of these three studies included an active control group [41]. The duration and sample sizes of two out of these three studies can be considered as strengths [43] [35]. Although possible causal relations could be tested more easily, caution is needed in interpreting findings of Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35], due to attrition and possible practice effects.

Other, non-musical, related skills

Two studies were identified that examined the effects of music on other, specific skills. Slater et al. ( 2015 ) [46] conducted a controlled, longitudinal study to investigate the effect of music training on speech in noise perception in 38 eight year-old children, randomly assigned to the music training program ( n = 19) or the wait-list control group ( n = 19). The authors reported a significant improvement of hearing in noise after 2 years of music training (Slater et al., 2015 ). Another longitudinal study of François et al. ( 2013 ) [45] tracked 24 eight year-old children after they were pseudo-randomly assigned to either a music training program or a painting program. They found that performance on both behavioral and electrophysiological measures of speech segmentation (i.e., the ability to extract meaningless words from a continuous flow of non-sense syllables) steadily increased across the testing sessions for the music group compared to the painting group.

Both studies, reporting positive results, employed a 2-year, longitudinal design and used valid (computer) measures to evaluate the performance of participants. Randomization, thereby reducing the risk of sampling bias, was used only in one study [46]. Information about the blinding of outcome assessors was not reported and only one out of the two studies employed an active control group [45]. Although sample sizes can be considered small, thereby limiting the external validity of findings, both studies propose an interesting direction for further research.

This review analyzed the evidence of 46 studies, dealing with five developmental domains, including the motor, social, cognitive, language, and academic domain.

With regard to the motor domain, the two studies identified suggested a positive influence of music interventions on specific motor skills (eye-hand motor sequences, discrete and continuous movements) [1] [2]. Due to the quasi-experimental design of the studies, the limited sample of participants and the inclusion of an active control group in one sub-experiment of one study only [1], clear conclusions cannot be drawn.

It cannot be concluded whether music interventions can positively influence social and emotional development as results of the nine studies reviewed [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [42] are inconclusive. The findings of two experimental studies [3] [6] suggest a beneficial impact of music interventions on empathy and spontaneous cooperative and helpful behavior. The merging of the active and passive control group into one control group and the small sample size in one of the two studies, should, however, be taken into consideration. Positive findings of another study [7] turned out to be related to the level of cognitive functioning of participants in the music group. Caution is needed in drawing conclusions from the partially positive findings of Ritblatt et al. ( 2013 ) [4] and Schellenberg et al. ( 2015 ) [5] due to the design used [5] and the representativeness of the sample [4]. Two other experimental studies [8] [42] found modest effects and no effects, respectively, on social skills and self-esteem.

Regarding the language domain, 15 studies evaluating the impact of music interventions on phonological awareness and auditory processing and reading skills [12] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [22] [23] [35], and no clear conclusions can be drawn in this area. The results of two randomized controlled trials are inconclusive. The results of four experimental studies with (stratified) randomization [13] [11] [20] [23] suggested beneficial effects of music interventions on reading skills [20] [23], however, not on phonological skills [11] [13]. Of these four studies, two included both an active and a passive control group [13] [23], allowing for a more comprehensive comparison. Of the remaining six studies, quasi-experimental (longitudinal) without randomization [10] [14] [16] [18] [22] and developmental longitudinal [35] in nature, three point to the beneficial effects of music [16] [18] [22]. The other three studies, including an active [10] or both an active and passive control group [14] or comparing participants to themselves [35], found no impact of music interventions.

With regard to the cognitive domain, seven studies reviewed provided insufficient information whether music can have a positive effect on intelligence. The results of an RCT [21] showed no effects and two experimental studies, only one of them including an active control group, yielded mixed results [30] [42]. Evidence of three quasi-experimental (longitudinal) studies [24] [25] [26] and longitudinal developmental study suggest a (partially) positive influence of music. However, an active control group was included in just one of these three studies [25]. Evidence of five (quasi-) experimental longitudinal studies seem to suggest potential benefits of music on memory. However, due to lowering generalizability of findings on one study [32], by including participants with Williams syndrome only, and methodological limitations of the other four studies (i.e., no randomization [1] [30] [31] [33] and/or no inclusion of an active control group [30] [31]), clear conclusions cannot be made. Among the six quasi-experimental studies exploring the potential influence of music on attention and EF skills, only two studies [25] [38] reported positive results. An additional five studies on working memory also seemed to suggest a positive influence. Whether or not an active control was included, the lack of randomization and the fact that working memory, attention and EF skills are difficult concepts to define, may have influenced the results obtained.

Regarding academic performance, research suggests some possible beneficial effects of music, although precise conclusions cannot be reached on the basis of reviewed studies. It cannot be concluded whether participation in a music program had a positive effect on promoting a positive approach due to the lack of randomization, the representativeness of the sample, the potential influence of parental and teacher expectations and the fact that the findings are based one study only [4]. The studies evaluating the impact of music interventions on first and second language development showed mixed findings. Regarding first language development, an RCT showed a positive effect, whereas a longitudinal study of Yang et al. ( 2014 ) reported no effects. Another two quasi-experimental studies showed improvement in second language performance [43] [44]. However, both studies included a passive control group. Of the four studies exploring the influence of music interventions on mathematics, one RCT reported positive effects [21]. Caution is needed in making causal inferences on the three remaining studies [41] [43] [35] due to the design used, the absence of randomization [41] [43] and, with regard to the study of Bergman Nutley et al. ( 2014 ) [35], attrition rate and possible practice effects. Evidence from the studies regarding the effectiveness of music on language and mathematics are reviewed separately. One can question whether there is a legitimate distinction between the two domains, as research suggest partial overlap between neural regions associated with language and arithmetic (Baldo and Dronkers, 2007 ; Cummine et al., 2014 ).

Five studies used a correlational design [9] [12] [15] [19] [37], reporting (partially) positive correlations between duration of music intervention and performance on reading and phonological awareness tasks, attention behavior, and self-esteem. Although correlational studies can provide an indication of a possible association between musical training and functioning domains, they do not allow for causal inferences.

The tool used for the methodological quality assessment allowed scoring between zero and five only. This makes a cut-off point difficult to determine. Although all domains included studies with lower quality scoring (two or less), these were more frequently found in the social and cognitive domain. This, however, does not mean that the results of these studies are invalid, but rather gives a direct for reading and interpreting them. The lower score of the study could often be explained by either unbalanced baseline characteristics, absence of randomization or missing information about blinding of outcome assessors or attrition rate. When analyzing the outcomes of the quality screening, one should take into consideration that it can be assessed with a broad range of tools. Upon applying the chosen tool, it was found that some of the items were difficult to relate to the studies at hand, but were more suitable for classical medical trials. Several criteria (including concealment of allocation and intention to treat) were negatively assessed in almost all studies, as they were not designed for the specifics of educational studies, where often it is impossible to ensure the rigid methodological quality: i.e., create double blind randomized trials.

When assessing the quality of the studied, there are several considerations regarding study design, music interventions, and the role of the teacher. In reporting on the participants, we found that little is mentioned about the intrinsic motivation of participants in the context of the intervention. As intrinsic motivation is associated with initiation and persistence of activities, level of effort and improved performance (Patall et al., 2008 ), gaining insight into the motivation of participants is important to be able to determine its impact on outcome measures. In some studies, interventions were partially provided by the authors themselves [1] [3] [6] [10] [22] [28] [36], or by parents and teachers [4]. As their expectations can have an effect on the performance of participants (the “Rosenthal effect”), one needs to be aware that observer bias rather than the intervention could cause the observed changes. Results of several studies might also have been affected by the “Hawthorne effect” i.e., a tendency of participants to alter their behavior because they are aware that they are studied. This effect cannot be ruled out or confirmed for diverse studies after screening.

Most of the study designs consisted of quasi-experimental and longitudinal designs and three studies were a RCTs. An RCT is considered as providing the strongest evidence of determining whether a cause-effect relationship exists between an intervention and outcomes (Sibbald and Roland, 1998 ) as assessment bias and confounding are minimalized. However, some research questions and settings don't permit random assignment of participants and questions may arise about the sample being representative enough of the population and the generalizability of findings to the field. As it is important to consider evidence from other methodologies as well to better understand the potential of music interventions in practice, only an RCT allows the observed effects to be causally attributed to differences between the intervention and the control group(s).

In reviewed studies, active and/or passive control groups were included in evaluating the effectiveness of a music intervention. Although showing whether participants benefit from an intervention compared to participants not receiving the intervention, passive control groups do not allow to test for intervention specific effects (Strobach and Karbach, 2016 ). Inclusion of an active control group, engaging participants in some training and activities during the intervention, can provide evidence as to whether an intervention is relatively more efficient than participating in another program (Karlsson and Bergmark, 2015 ), provided that the intervention and control group are matched on possible influencing factors and perform the same tasks.

Regarding the music interventions, studies were not uniform in their conceptualization of these music interventions. Some were very broadly defined and included listening, singing, instrumental playing, performing, movement, and musical creativity. While others, especially focused on the acquisition of non-musical skills, were more precisely defined and designed. Differences in musical content deserve attention in likely contributing to the outcomes of music interventions. Interventions in groups may have additional benefits of social interaction and motivation above the intervention itself compared to individual interventions which could have played a role in its final outcomes. In this review, the role of the teacher also emerged as a significant issue. 18 of the included studies employed (professional) music teachers and 16 reported at least partly positive outcomes. Teaching music requires many competencies. Strong teaching skills without musical skills and knowledge is not sufficient and vice versa. Research points not only to musical content knowledge, but also to pedagogical content knowledge and non-pedagogical professional knowledge (Ballantyne and Packer, 2004 ). By the way they teach, they play an important role in the teacher-child relationship which may have in turn implications for children's behavioral and academic adjustment (Furrer and Skinner, 2003 ). Therefore, teachers may also be an important factor in the context in which the effectiveness of music interventions is researched.

Another point of attention when describing the effects of music interventions on the development of children is the methodological accuracy and variety of different approaches the researchers took in their studies. Being the most powerful research design for evaluating interventions, further RCTs are needed to determine whether music interventions are effective in stimulating development in children. However, particularly in the domain of music interventions in schools, some requirements such as blinding, randomization, and controlling for potential sources of variability are often difficult if not impossible to achieve and RCTs may create an artificial situation in which findings may not always be applied to everyday practice. While we acknowledge the need for high-quality research methodology, it is important to find a balance between the externally imposed methodological standards and the drive to investigate a said phenomenon in its natural environment. As qualitative research can provide more insight into the characteristics of the intervention and can generate potential hypotheses for quantitative research, combining qualitative and quantitative research can give more comprehensive and integrated insights in potential effects of music interventions.

In conclusion, although the underlying mechanisms are not always clear, evidence of reviewed studies seems suggestive of some beneficial effects. Having a clearer view of effects and possible influencing factors may pave the way for further research on the influence of music on the developing child.

Author contributions

ED the main author and executor of the research and participated in data collection and analysis as well as article writing process. ES was a second reviewer of the selected articles, contributed to development of methodology, data extraction, and analyses as well as final comments on the article writing. FF and SvH contributed to the idea of the development of the article as well as development of the research methodology and provided feedback during the article writing stage.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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Taylor Swift: why academics are studying the pop star

Taylor Swift is the biggest pop star in the world and a seemingly unlikely subject of academic study around Australia and the world. The American superstar made Grammys history this month winning Album of the Year for the fourth time, soon after being named Time magazine’s Person of the Year. Forbes magazine declared the 34-year-old American the most powerful woman in the entertainment industry and fifth in the world for 2023, stating she is “an advocate for the empowerment of women and a champion for all musicians seeking greater ownership of their work.”

The conference or Swiftposium - hosted by the University of Melbourne in collaboration with the University of Sydney, RMIT University, Curtin University, Auckland University of Technology and Monash University - highlighted how a single artist has impacted contemporary life, with papers exploring Swift’s influence across the intersection of music, economics, business, media studies, health, and societal and cultural impact.

Brittany Spanos, New York University (NYU) Adjunct Instructor and senior writer for Rolling Stone opened the conference, delivering a keynote address examining Swift’s career in relation to the music industry, musicology, feminism and race.

a young woman in a pink dress is giving a talk about Taylor Swift

Dr Georgia Carroll presenting the keynote at the Swiftposium. 

Dr Georgia Carroll, a researcher who completed her PhD on fandom and celebrity in the Discipline of Sociology at the University of Sydney delivered the Early Career Researcher keynote on the second day. Dr Carroll’s keynote was titled: “’My pennies made your crown’: Taylor Swift as your Billionaire Best Friend” and explored the intersection of fandom and economic consumption in the Taylor Swift fan community. It examined how Swift encourages individuals to purchase merchandise, multiple versions of her albums, and concert tickets in order to be viewed as the "right" kind of fan and gain her attention. 

Other papers covered topics such as lyrical poetics, cyber-security, AI, mental health, public relations and “Swiftonomics”, referring to the economic impact of Taylor on local and global economies both in terms of her touring and her wider role in the entertainment industry. There was also a stream exploring Swift as a teaching tool in higher education, following recent courses on her and her work at institutions including Harvard University, Stanford University and NYU.

@abcnewsaus How well do you know Taylor Swift and her international impact? Academics from around the world have gathered at the Swiftposium conference in Melbourne to discuss her influence on music, cities, creatives and more.  #TaylorSwift #ErasTour #ErasTourAus #ABCNews ♬ original sound - ABC News Australia

University of Sydney experts from philosophy, sociology, English and psychology share why they are studying the lyrics and music of the American pop star.

Philosophy, forgiveness and Taylor Swift

Associate Professor Luke Russell , lecturer in ethics and critical thinking in the Discipline of Philosophy, said the singer-songwriter has a strong view on forgiveness, a subject he has recently published a book on, Real Forgiveness .  

“I’m a philosopher who writes on the topic of forgiveness," he said. "Taylor Swift holds an interesting and contentious view about forgiveness, a view that she has explained in interviews and has expressed in her songs. 

“Swift rejects the claim that we always ought to offer unconditional forgiveness to those who have wronged us. This puts her in conflict with advocates of unconditional forgiveness, including many Christians and therapists. I think that Swift is right about this, and her insights on this topic can help philosophers to see why sometimes forgiving is the wrong thing to do.” 

Greek philosophy, betrayal and Taylor Swift

Pop singer Taylor Swift wearing a sparkling bodysuit on stage for her Eras tour.

Taylor Swift performs in Nashville, May 5, 2023 Photo: George Walker IV, AP/AAP Photos

Dr Emily Hulme is a lecturer in Ancient Greek philosophy in the Discipline of Philosophy. Her research interests include Plato’s epistemology and ethics, philosophy of language from Parmenides to the Stoics, and arguments concerning the status of women in the ancient world. Dr Hulme said:

“I work in Greek philosophy, a philosophical tradition where reflection on art and emotions is understood to be a key part of our development as humans. We can learn a lot about ourselves through emotionally engaging with art that pulls no punches in talking about vulnerability, trust, and betrayal. And Taylor Swift has a lot of songs that fit that bill.” 

Sociology, identity, and Taylor Swift

Dr Georgia Carroll a researcher who completed her PhD in fandom in the Discipline of Sociology at the University of Sydney said:  “I wrote my PhD on Taylor Swift and her fandom because as a long-time Swiftie, I knew that there was something special about the relationship she shares with her fans. Many of Taylor's fans feel as though they have grown up alongside her, built a real connection with her, and that her music has served as a kind of overarching soundtrack to their lives. 

“As sociologists, we strive to understand society and its intersection with culture, identity, social relationships, and power structures, and celebrity fandom is a perfect window into all of those things.”  

English poetry, Shakespeare and Taylor Swift

Professor Liam Semler , is a Shakespeare scholar and teaches Early Modern Literature in the Discipline of English. He has a new paper on teaching Shakespeare’s sonnets using the lyrics from Taylor Swift’s album Midnights. He also teaches a unit called Shakespeare and Modernity, using Taylor Swift’s lyrics. Professor Semler said: “As the marketing for Midnights as a concept album started to permeate popular culture, I felt there was a fascinating, but not explicit, array of parallels to early modern sonnet sequences. 

“There are plenty of songs on the album that work well in class and connect to thematic and poetic elements relevant to Shakespeare’s sonnets. In my unit ‘Shakespeare and Modernity,’ Swift is part of a multidimensional picture as we explore the design principles and thematics of sonnet collections, including the literary work of Jen Bervin and Luke Kennard who rewrite the sonnets in fresh and provocative ways.” 

Psychology, archetypes and Taylor Swift

Kayla Greenstien, a PhD candidate in psychology said: “I study the theoretical orientations behind psychedelic therapies, including Jungian archetypes and using myths to explore deeper truths about human experiences. 

“After seeing Eras Tour footage on TikTok, I started thinking about Taylor Swift's entire artistic output as a form of uniquely modern mythopoeticism. There's a lot we can learn about archetypal experiences and who's voice they represent from looking at Swift's work through this lens.” 

Top Photo: Taylor Swift performs at the Monumental stadium during her Eras Tour concert in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Thursday, Nov. 9, 2023. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko/AAP Photos)

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Exploring the impact of music education on the psychological and academic outcomes of students: mediating role of self-efficacy and self-esteem.

\r\nJian Sun*\r\n

  • School of Music and Dance, Xihua University, Chengdu, China

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in scholars and practitioners to explore the factors that lead to an improvement in Students’ psychological wellbeing. Due to the tough challenges faced by students during their academic life, severe issues of stress, anxiety, and other mental health issues emerge, which affect their academic performance and have a long-lasting impact on their future careers. The pandemic accelerates the stress levels, anxiety, and mental issues of students. The main purpose of this study was to explore how music education impacts on Students’ psychological wellbeing and academic performance. This study also investigates the mediating effect of self-esteem and self-efficacy. To the best of our knowledge, there has been little to no study exploring the relationship of music education on the psychological wellbeing and performance of students, especially from the perspective of Asian countries. This study was conducted in undergraduate and graduate institutions of China. This study was quantitative in nature and data were collected from 319 respondents. The structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was employed for data analysis. Results reveal that music education has a significant positive impact on psychological wellbeing, which improves Students’ academic performance. Moreover, psychological wellbeing also has a significant and positive impact on Students’ academic performance. Self-efficacy and self-esteem significantly mediate the relationship between music education and psychological wellbeing. The findings of this study open new avenues for future research in music education and psychological wellbeing. This study suggests that the policymakers and practitioners should make such policies that encourage educational institutes to adopt music education to improve the psychological wellbeing of students.

Introduction

A huge amount of scientific research shows that the pandemic and its associated illness has a significant influence on the behavoir and mental health of individuals ( Loades et al., 2020 ; Luo et al., 2020 ), with only a few studies indicating contrary ( Gijzen et al., 2020 ). Even during the month of April 2020, when most people were on lockdown due to the pandemic, mental health hotlines in the United States saw 100-fold increases. Many healthcare centers have reported more casualties from suicide, likely due to severe psychological problems, than from the novel coronavirus. Several persons who in the past were not into wellbeing, now have more chance of getting into trouble during the pandemic regarding their health concerns due to the inability of generating more economic means. The pandemic has an influence on a wide range of people, but because of the uncertainty surrounding academic progress, social life, and employment, college students are among the most severely impacted ( Kim et al., 2020 ). Students all over the world were experiencing rising feelings of anxiety, negative moods, low self-esteem, psychological symptoms, drug addiction, and suicidal behaviors even before the epidemic ( Huo et al., 2020 ; Nawaz et al., 2020a ; Wu et al., 2020 ).

Consequently, students now require more resources and help to deal with the health-related adversities due to COVID-19. Students would be well-treated during this pandemic if the officials associated with the health of university students have pre-defined measures for coping with the negative impacts of the pandemic on psychological factors. These consequences provide enough insight about appropriate and necessary measures to be taken for addressing the health issues of students ( Hunt and Eisenberg, 2010 ). College students have traditionally underused psychiatric and counseling services. Recognizing which sub-populations may be affected by certain mixtures of psychological effects can help with specific therapies, effective treatment, and coping methods for those who are most at risk. To combat the possibility of illness spreading, the government has taken a number of steps. Isolation and loneliness, travel limitations, gathering restrictions, travel quarantine, trading closures, working from home, self-isolation, lockdowns, curfews, and university closures are all examples of these methods ( Hao et al., 2020 ; Nawaz et al., 2020b ; Sattar et al., 2020 ). Governments in a range of countries have imposed a lockdown or curfew as a precaution against the rapid spread of the virus ( Abdullah et al., 2020 ; Paital et al., 2020 ; Boonroungrut et al., 2022 ). Such policies have an adverse impact on business, schooling, healthcare, and entertainment across the globe.

Many institutions worldwide have delayed or canceled all campus events to reduce crowding and thereby viral spread. On the other hand, these policies have greater economic, medical, and social consequences for both postgraduate and undergrad communities. Owing to the cessation of classroom training at several colleges and institutions, undergraduate and graduate students can now benefit from online instruction ( Iyer et al., 2020 ; Sahu, 2020 ; Yamin, 2020 ). This kind of instruction offers an option to minimize either student-to-student interaction or student-to-lecturer contact. Unfortunately, many students are unable to access online education owing to a lack of resources or equipment as a result of the economic and digital gap. COVID-19 has been linked to educational studies in a few papers ( Kanneganti et al., 2020 ; Mian and Khan, 2020 ; Sandhu and de Wolf, 2020 ). Graduate practitioners, dental medical students, and radiological trainees are all affected by COVID-19 ( Alvin et al., 2020 ).

This study aims to establish a strong relationship between music education and analyzing the impact of music education on Students’ wellbeing and academic performance in universities. The primary goal of good education is to develop social thinkers who think creatively. While stimulating learners’ vision and imagination, music education may enhance Students’ passions, sentiments, and other non-intellectual variables, fulfilling the goal of nurturing Students’ inventive identities. As a result, music instruction at colleges and universities is an effective way to help students overcome “poorly functioning” personalities ( Arora and Singh, 2020 ). Students may develop their innovative identities and feel a feeling of self and self-efficacy via music instruction, allowing them to transcend personality flaws caused by the many negative elements in today’s cultural milieu. When it comes to efforts to improve music instruction in universities and colleges ( Chen et al., 2019a ).

Researchers believe that education about music at educational institutes could develop creative thinking in students. Such education could be initiated by theorizing the impact of music on regulating the function of psychology for the wellbeing of the students. This could be combined with actual teaching methods to identify a way forward for the improvement of the mental health of students through mixed-method teaching. Students at the post-matriculation level could be advised to actively participate in such music education activities to develop a mastery of music. This would aid in developing open-mindedness in students of this level and inter-communication skills regarding learning would also be improved. It will develop a culture of understanding others at a social level and their sense of self-control would also improve. It would also help them in reducing anxiety and lead to psychological wellbeing, ultimately leading to sound health ( Ling et al., 2020 ).

Generally, it is assumed that teaching music is not only a way of learning an art, but also has a significant role in psychological regulation and treatment; thus, education in music will lead to a specific role in treating the disease at educational institutes because the most important goal is to cultivate students independent personalities. Some music instructors frequently utilize their prowess to intimidate pupils and swamp them with information. Contextual motives now account for a considerable portion of learning outcomes ( Bagozzi and Yi, 1988 ; Hair et al., 2014 ). The students at this level would consider this challenging for keeping a pace in learning in this discipline if outside motives are removed. Colleges and universities must begin with Students’ actual mental wellbeing and provide colorful music teaching activities, which have been extensively used in the practice of college Students’ mental health work, and the role of psychological regulation function ( Zupan and Gadpaille, 2020 ). It can specifically assist children in improving their psychological health by establishing music education rooms using teaching tools at school level.

This may assist students in realizing the importance of the positive mental ability to develop learning skills by offering appropriate music psychological optional courses centered on topics that are relevant to their learning and lives. It can assist students in forming positive circles of friends and enhancing emotional interactions amongst them ( Le Prell et al., 2018 ). Furthermore, we may use Internet resources to undertake digital psychological counseling exercises, assist students by recommending additional attractive and motivational music compositions, and teach a certain basic understanding of music education, such that learners enjoy getting psychological enjoyment from melody. Simultaneously, the institute’s psychological aspects, utilizing music as a carrier, strengthening communication between students through games, performances, and other means, establishing a decent vibe of assisting individuals, cooperation, and love, in such a delicate way to monitor Students’ self-conscious study stress, help each other avoid depression, and promote a healthy psychological condition ( Chen et al., 2019b ; Wang et al., 2019 ). The impact of music education on the wellbeing, psychological, and academic outcomes of the students could be mediated by the well-known concepts of self-esteem and self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is an the confidence of an individual in managing their environment, which determines how they act, perceive, and think about coming occurrences. Self-esteem is a person’s overall positive or negative assessment of their own value. Self-esteem has been linked to happiness, fulfillment, good stress management, and coping with difficult situations ( Bandura, 1977 ; Yıldırım et al., 2017 ). In the context of our study, both self-esteem and self-efficacy could yield significant results in terms of helping the model and mediating the relationship of music education with Students’ wellbeing and the academic outcomes in the era of the pandemic. Our study mainly focuses on the above-developed relationships in Students’ performance and their wellbeing. This study was based on certain objectives as follows: (1) To assess the relationship of musical education with the psychological wellbeing of the students and academic performance. (2) To evaluate self-esteem as a mediator between wellbeing and the academic performance of students. (3) To evaluate the mediating role of Students’ self-efficacy between music education and psychological wellbeing and academic outcomes during the pandemic.

The study has been structured thus: the first section explains the introduction and supporting literature, while the second section supports the hypothesis development and study model. Research methodology and data analysis have been written up in the third section. The fourth section contains the discussion and concluding remarks.

Review of Literature and Hypotheses Development

This research study revolves around the impact of music education on the psychological wellbeing of students along with their academic outcomes. Self-esteem and self-efficacy play a mediating role in the relationship of these. These are supported by the following theories.

Social Cognitive Theory

This theory helps in describing the functionality of humans with an emphasis on processes of an interactive nature. The cognitive activities are assigned a special role by the theory through which individuals could obtain a handful of insight from their surroundings. Individuals could give a reflection of the theory along with mixing of own behaviors and the ideas. This could also regulate the processes of own self-efficacy. The objective behind connecting this theory with music education was to investigate the significance of developments for developing acceptable learning and teaching practices for advanced students. It is critical to have a good theoretical foundation for understanding how learning happens when planning curricula and instructional services for children with outstanding academic ability. To explain human functioning, social cognitive theory stresses a dynamic interactive process between environmental, behavioral, and personal components. This understanding of human connections and functioning became characterized as a set of triadic reciprocal causation ( Avotra et al., 2021a ). The theory assigns a major role to cognitive processes in which a person may watch others and the environment, reflect on it in conjunction with their own ideas and behaviors, and adjust their own self-regulatory functions as a result. When looking at learning interventions for that demographic, a learning model that stresses the primary role of cognition appears reasonable. Human agency and perceived self-efficacy are components of the social cognitive paradigm that influences cognitive growth and performance. So, a link could be developed in light of this theory toward the role of music education in developing certain cognitive factors in students for psychological wellbeing.

Self-Esteem Theory

Self-esteem is still one of the most widely studied topics in social psychology. Self-esteem is often thought of as a component of one’s self-concept ( Harder, 1994 ), although it is one of the most significant aspects of one’s self-concept for certain people. Indeed, self-esteem looked to be interchangeable with self-concept in the literature on the self for a time. The link of strong self-esteem with a range of favorable outcomes for individuals and communities as a whole has prompted this attention on self-esteem. Furthermore, there is a general view that boosting one’s self-esteem (particularly that of a child or teenager) is advantageous to both the individual and society ( Cast and Burke, 2002 ). Self-esteem can relate to a person’s total self or specific components of their self, such as how they feel about their social status, ethnic or racial group, physical characteristics, physical prowess, and work or school achievement. Theorists have indeed classified various kinds of self-esteem as contingent vs. non-contingent; visible vs. tacit; genuine vs. fake; steady vs. volatile; worldwide vs. sector-specific. In terms of the complexity of self-esteem, many writers see it as a single, worldwide characteristic, while some others see it as a heterogeneous feature with distinct constituent parts such as the interpersonal, cognitive, and actual self. Differentiation has been made between a false sense of self-worth and a genuine sense of self-worth. Self-esteem which is dependent on meeting certain criteria of achievement or staying true to certain relational or psychological aspirations is referred to as contingent self-esteem ( Deci and Ryan, 1995 ). This is a form of self-aggrandizement related to being ego-involved in certain objectives and obtaining them diligently. This is frequently related to social comparison and is typically associated with narcissism. From the other part, true self-esteem is much more consistent and is founded on a stable and resilient sense of self. Their value would be represented in action, proactive behavior, and vibrancy as an integral component of their self. When it comes to assessing self-esteem, many writers differentiate among explicit and implicit self-esteem, although that is the reflectively unrecognized influence of self-attitude on the judgment of nature vs. self-dissociated objects. In this connection of the theory, self-esteem was identified as a mediator between the relationship of music education and academic outcomes.

Self-Determination Theory

Self-determination is a key concept in psychology that relates to a person’s ability to make decisions and govern their own lives. This skill is crucial to one’s mental stability and wellbeing. Individuals who have self-determination believe they have self-control in life. This also affects motivation since individuals are much more driven to act if they believe their actions will have an impact on the result. Self-determination was used in a variety of fields, notably education and health care. According to research, having a high level of self-determination can help one succeed in a variety of areas. According to this theory, people can become self-determined when their demands for competency, connectedness, and independence are met. The concept of self-determination emerged from the research of scientists ( Deci and Ryan, 1995 ), who published their views in the book “Self-Determination and Intrinsic Motivation in Human Behavior.”

They established a motivational theory that argued that individuals are motivated by a desire to learn and improve. Self-determination theory is a meta-theory of motivation and personal development, including psychological wellbeing, that is scientifically grounded ( Ryan and Deci, 2000 ). According to the idea, all humans are born with a strong sense of curiosity and a desire to learn, and that certain contextual conditions may either promote or inhibit a person’s feeling of wellbeing, self-regulation, and intrinsic drive to learn. Belonging, competence, and autonomy are three intrinsic and basic psychological demands identified by the theory. Based on this theory, a study related to music participation was conducted by Krause et al. (2019) . All these theories provided a strong ground for the mediators used in this study for the Students’ psychological wellbeing and academic outcomes.

Music Education Relationship With Psychological Wellbeing, Self-Esteem, and Self-Efficacy

A few studies have been conducted in the past to look into the impact of music education on Students’ psychological wellbeing from different perspectives (e.g., Croom, 2014 ; Demirbatır, 2015 ; Erginsoy Osmanoğlu and Yilmaz, 2019 ; Krause et al., 2019 ; Mehraban, 2020 ). Through stimulating Students’ imagination and association, music education may enhance Students’ interests, emotions, and other non-intellectual variables, fulfilling the goal of nurturing Students’ inventive personalities. As a result, music instruction at colleges and universities is an effective way to help students overcome their “dysfunctional” personalities. Students may regulate their own identities for developing a feeling of self-efficacy via music instruction, allowing them to overcome the numerous personality flaws caused by the many negative forces in today’s cultural context ( Arora and Singh, 2020 ). The significance of music education for treating illness could be effectively performed in educational institutes since it is understood that educating music is a way of tutoring art and has significance in psychological regulation and treatment. Music education’s personal development benefits have gotten less emphasis. Yet, other research continues to link music training to the development of psychological advantages, such as self-efficacy.

Another study of middle school and high school band, choruses, and orchestral Students’ self-efficacy was undertaken by several researchers. The findings revealed a small positive association between musical ability and self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is higher among students who have a higher level of musical talent. While this research shows a link between music ability and self-efficacy, it does not examine the influence of tutoring music on children lacking this ability by contrast ( Zelenak, 2015 ). The benefits of individual music instruction on pupils’ self-esteem have been proven in studies. Despite the fact that all students have identical motor skills, musical ability, and cognitive abilities, there is concrete evidence that children receiving paid piano lessons have a considerable advantage in developing self-esteem compared to counterparts unable to get tutoring on music education ( Costa-Giomi, 2004 ). Researchers back up this assertion by stating that an active passion for music is statistically significant in predicting self-esteem in children who have paid music tutoring ( Wu and Lu, 2021 ). Research into the influence of school-based music programs on personal development has also been undertaken.

The study focused on a music program that offered general music sessions to primary school children during the school day. The control group received no musical education and suffered a drop in self-esteem. The ones who were enrolled for music learning did not experience a drop in self-esteem. The hand drumming music program in Australia was shown to result in self-esteem being boosted by a substantial amount along with reducing problems associated with behaviors in the children who recently completed their training ( Faulkner et al., 2010 ; Rickard et al., 2013 ). When researchers looked at high school students reporting specific personal reasons for participating in music-related co-curricular activities, they discovered that they cited sentiments of good self-esteem and self-efficacy. Furthermore, researchers discovered that drumming participants in Africa thought of themselves as serving the cause of music. They felt like it was a great thing to be a part of and it boosted their ability in having the satisfaction of self-efficacy in concluding the lengthy research on learners ( Barbre, 2013 ). All these supportive papers suggested relationships between music education and the psychological wellbeing of students, along with the self-esteem and self-efficacy of the students, so we propose the following:

H 1 . There is a relationship between Music education and psychological wellbeing.

H 2 . There is a relationship between Music education and self-esteem.

H 3 . There is a relationship between Music education and self-efficacy.

Role of Self-Esteem on the Wellbeing of Students Psychologically

According to the research on self-esteem, there is a substantial relationship between self-esteem and psychological wellbeing. However, this relationship differs depending on the sort of self-esteem being studied. Self-esteem, for example, has been shown to play a beneficial influence in boosting psychological wellbeing in a broad body of research. Furthermore, culture has indeed been found to influence the causal relations between self-esteem and happiness. In individualistic civilizations, self-esteem was shown to be more strongly linked to life satisfaction than in collectivist societies. Individuals from individualistic cultures may value their distinctive qualities and personal characteristics, making self-esteem a more important factor. Individuals in collectivist societies, on the other hand, may place a higher emphasis on relational and communal elements of the self. In collectivist societies it is critical to understand which types of self-esteem are favorable to psychological wellbeing ( Diener and Diener, 2009 ; Sowislo and Orth, 2013 ).

Some researchers studied the relationship between self-esteem and psychological wellbeing by expanding self-esteem studies beyond the individual to the social level. As per the social identity theory, the collective is an important element of the self, and hence assessing the collective self may help people feel better about themselves. Indeed, they discovered that self-esteem was significantly linked with wellbeing in many white, Black, and Asian students in the United States. Even so, once individual self was taken into account, the relationship between collective self-esteem and wellbeing became non-significant for white students, small for Black students, and moderate too strong for Asian students. This shows that culture may have a significant impact on the importance of various sorts of self-esteem ( Crocker et al., 1994 ). Many studies, such as Singhal and Prakash (2021) , indicated a significant relationship among the wellbeing of students and self-esteem. Numerous of studies also pointed out the mediating role of self-esteem from different perspectives and found a significant contribution of self-esteem as a mediator ( Hesari and Hejazi, 2011 ; Bajaj et al., 2016 ). These studies suggested the role of self-esteem as mediator in music education and psychological wellbeing in the context of our study, so we developed the following hypotheses.

H 4 . There is a relationship between self-esteem and psychological wellbeing.

H 7 . Self-esteem mediates between music education and psychological wellbeing.

Role of Self-Efficacy and Psychological Wellbeing

People who have a high level of self-efficacy have a can-do attitude, which helps them to perceive obstacles as issues to solve problems rather than avoid them. They also create appropriately challenging objectives for themselves and stick to them with tenacity. Because they are extremely engaged, people with high self–efficacy love life. When they are confronted with difficult events, their confidence in their capacity to control the situation to their advantage leads them to be self-assured. Greater wellbeing, stress control, greater self-esteem, improved physical state, and better illness adaptation and survival are linked to high self-efficacy. On the other hand, poor self-efficacy seems linked to increased symptoms of anxiety and depression, along with decreased rates of psychological wellbeing ( Bandura et al., 2003 ). A lot of studies such as Siddiqui (2015) indicated a significant positive correlation between self-efficacy and the psychological wellbeing and suggested analyzing the relationship in our context of the study. Several researchers concluded the mediation of self-efficacy in various situations in which self-efficacy plays a mediating role between different variables and contexts ( Zhao et al., 2005 ; Molero et al., 2018 ; Sabouripour et al., 2021 ). These studies found a positive strong mediation of self-efficacy and helped us in developing the following hypotheses of this study:

H 5 . There is a relationship between self-efficacy and psychological wellbeing.

H 6 . Self-efficacy mediates between music education and psychological wellbeing.

Relationship Between Psychological Wellbeing and the Academic Performance

This interesting connection between academic outcomes and Students’ psychological wellbeing had been studied many times in the past and found significant results ( Bhat and Siddiqui, 2015 ; Alkhatib, 2020 ; Amholt et al., 2020 ; Gökalp, 2020 ; Chaudhry and Ikram, 2021 ). Psychological suffering has been identified as a serious and pressing concern among university students across the world. According to a study done in the United States, psychology is responsible for five of the top six health-related issues. High psychological distress and low psychological wellbeing are two classifications that may be used to describe university students who are suffering from a high level of mental illness. According to a study conducted by experts, university students in Australia discovered that high levels of psychological wellbeing were associated with reduced levels of depression. However, a lack of psychological wellbeing leads to an increase in despair. A scale to evaluate psychological wellbeing and psychological discomfort was used to evaluate the wellbeing of students. The link between discomfort and psychological wellbeing is presented in the research ( Bhullar et al., 2014 ; Roslan et al., 2017 ; Sharp and Theiler, 2018 ). All this supporting literature hinted about the connection of the wellbeing of students and academic achievement in terms of performance, so we propose the following hypothesis in this regard:

H 8 . There is a relationship between psychological wellbeing and Students’ academic performance.

This study is based on the following conceptual framework (see Figure 1 ).

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Figure 1. Conceptual model.

Methodology

The population of this research study are students studying in schools, colleges, and universities in China. This study is quantitative and empirical in nature. A survey questionnaire was designed to collect data from respondents. A total 350 questionnaires were distributed out of which only 319 questionnaires were received back so that the response rate of this study is 91%. Out of 319 respondents, 160 were boys/men and 159 respondents were girls/women. Similarly, 85 respondents were below the age of 10–15 years, 95 respondents between 16 and 20, and 130 respondents between 20 and 30 as depicted in Table 1 . Similarly, the qualifications of 190 respondents were undergraduate, while 129 respondents were graduates. The convenience sampling technique was used for data collection because it is the easiest way to collect data from the respondents ( Nawaz et al., 2019 ; Dar et al., 2022 ). Therefore, due to limited time, this study employs a convenience sampling technique. A total of 25 items were utilized from the literature to design a questionnaire for this study. Music education was measured by a five-item scale adopted from Dönmez et al. (2019) . The psychological wellbeing was measured by a five-item scale adopted from Diener et al. (2009) . Furthermore, self-esteem was measured by a four-item scale adopted from Rosenberg (1989) . Similarly, self-efficacy was assessed by a five-item scale from Schwarzer and Jerusalem (1995) . Students’ performance was measured by a six-item scale adopted from Rashid and Zaman (2018) . This study is quantitative and cross-sectional. The partial least square (PLS) method was used for data analysis. A statistical software Smart-PLS used for data analysis.

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Table 1. Demographic details.

Data Analysis and Results

This research study’s data was conducted using PLS methodology and statistical software Smart-PLS was used for data analysis. Data analysis consists of two stages, i.e., measurement analysis and structural analysis. In the first step, the measurement model was used to investigate the reliability, convergence, and validity of the construct. Finally, structural equation modeling (SEM) was used for testing of hypotheses.

Measurement Model

The measurement model of the constructs was examined in the first step to determine the reliability, convergence, and discriminant validity of latent constructs. In this study, latent variables are assessed by the observed indicators (items) and are reflective in nature. In the reflective model, indicators are affected by the latent variable in the other words arrows are toward the indicators from their latent variables as can be seen in Figure 2 measurement model in which arrows point from latent variables toward indicators. In the First step, indicator loading was measured for each construct. It has been proposed that if the value of outer loadings is greater than 0.70, it is acceptable, which means that construct represents the 70% of items that construct ( Hair et al., 2019 ; Avotra et al., 2021b ). However, some studies suggest that a value greater than 0.50 is also an acceptable reliability ( Hulland, 1999 ). In this study as indicated in Table 2 , all outer loading is greater than 0.50 which shows reliability, except for ME2, SE4, SEC5, SP6 which were removed from the model to generate better results. Cronbach’s alpha, composite reliability and rho_A test were used for investigating the internal consistency of the construct. According to Hair et al. (2019) , Cronbach’s alpha’s value should be higher than 0.7 to establish the internal consistency of constructs. Table 2 illustrates that Cronbach’s alpha of each latent construct is higher than 0.70 which shows higher internal consistency of scale. The second method that determines the internal reliability and consistency of a scale is composite reliability. All Composite Reliability (CR) values greater than 0.7 indicate Internal Consistency ( Hair et al., 2019 ; Yingfei et al., 2021 ). Table 2 highlights that the composite reliability of each latent construct is above 0.70 thus internal consistency is established. Third method for measuring reliability is rho_A. The value of rho_A is greater than 0.70 is acceptable for determining reliability ( Hair et al., 2019 ; Xiaolong et al., 2021 ). Table 2 reflects that all value of rho_A is greater than 0.70 thus internal consistency is established.

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Figure 2. Output of measurement model algorithm.

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Table 2. Reliability and convergent validity.

Convergent validity refers to all items of the constructs that are closely related to each other ( Hair et al., 2012 ). The average variance extracted (AVE) is used for determining convergent validity for all constructs. The threshold value of AVE is equal or greater than 0.5 to establish the convergent validity of constructs ( Hair et al., 2019 ). In this study, AVE for all the variables is above 0.50. Thus, convergent validity has been established.

Discriminant Validity

Discriminant validity refers to each construct being empirically distinct from other constructs. Discriminant validity discusses the differentiation of each latent variable from other variables. There are three methods to determine discriminant validity in Smart-PLS: Fornel and lacker criteria, Cross loadings, and Heterotrait-Monotraite. According to Fornell and Larcker (1981) , to establish the discriminant validity of constructs the square root of AVE of each variable in the research model must be higher than the correlation of the same variable with others. Table 3 indicates that the square root of AVE of each construct is greater than the diagonal values below. Hence, discriminant validity is established.

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Table 3. Fornell and Larker.

Another method to determine discriminant validity is cross-loading. After the Fornell and Larker method, cross-loading is an authentic method for determining discriminant validity. Criteria for this technique is that the values of each item with its own construct are higher as compared to other constructs. If the value of item is highly correlated to their own construct compared to other constructs, then discriminant validity is established in Table 4 .

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Table 4. Cross-loading.

Heterotrait-Monotrait ratio of correlations (HTMT) is another method for evaluating discriminant validity of the data in SEM proposed by Dijkstra and Henseler (2015) . If the values of HTMT are high, then the discriminate value problems arise. The threshold value of HTMT is 0.9 proposed by Dijkstra and Henseler (2015) which means two variables are correlated but not more than 0.9. All values of HTMT in Table 5 have a value less than 0.9, which reflects that the discriminant validity of constructs have been established.

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Table 5. HTMT ratio.

Collinearity Statistics (VIF)

Variance inflation factor values are used to investigate the collinearity Issues and common method biasness of structural model. According to Hair et al. (2019) VIF is an indicator which is used to measure whether all indicator variables are correlated to each other or not and to avoid all issues regarding the significance and its value must be less than three ( Hair et al., 2019 ). In our results, all values are less than three as shown in Table 6 . Hence, we conclude that there are no collinearity issues between the variables in the proposed structural model.

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Table 6. Collinearity statistics (VIF).

Model fitting parametric was tested before going for the structural assessment model. Model fits parametric includes SRMR (Standardized Root Mean Square Residual) and NFI (Normed fit indices). SRMR refers to “the difference between the observed correlation and the model implied correlation matrix whereby values are less than 0.08” ( Hu and Bentler, 1998 ). In this study value of SRMR is greater than 0.8 which meets the required criteria. The second model fit parametric is Normed fit indices (NFI), greater than 0.90. Value of normed fit indices is 0.901 which is acceptable. The structure equation model (SEM) provides the means that shows the hypothesized path by supporting the theoretical model. Basically, SEM model comprises with the hypothesized relationship between the independent and dependent variables in the projected research model. The structural model predicts that how well the theoretical model envisages the hypothesized pathways. For the current study, SEM Model is assessed with the coefficient of determination ( R 2 ), Coefficient of determination ( R 2) measures the variation in the dependent variable due to independent variables. R 2 -value of 0.75, 0.50, and 0.25 are considered substantial, moderate ( Hair et al., 2019 ). Table 7 shows the value of 0.570 for PWB which is strong. This shows that all independent variables have 57% variance in psychological wellbeing whereas value of 0.242 for self-esteem shows 24% variance in self-esteem due to all independent variables. Value of 0.242 for self-efficacy shows 25% variance in self-efficacy due to all independent variable. Moreover, value of 0.394 for student performance shows 39% variance in student performance due to all independent capacity is established.

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Table 7. Coefficient of determination ( R 2 ).

Hypothesis1 proposed that there is a relationship between music education and psychological wellbeing. Result indicates that Music education has a significant and positive effect on psychological wellbeing (β = 0.512, t = 9.010, p = 0.000). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. Hypothesis 2 proposed that there is a relationship between music education and self-esteem. Our result indicates that the ME has a significant and positive effect on self-esteem (β = 0.491, t = 9.873, p = 0.000). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. Hypothesis 3 proposed that there is a relationship between music education and self-efficacy. Results indicate that music education has significant and positive effect on self-efficacy (β = 0.504, t = 11.492, p = 0.000). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. Hypothesis 4 proposed that there is a relationship between self-esteem and psychological wellbeing. Results indicate that the SE has a significant and positive effect on psychological wellbeing (β = 0.125, t = 2.386, p = 0.017). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. Hypothesis 5 proposed that there is a relationship between self-efficacy and psychological wellbeing. The result indicates that the SEC has a significant and positive effect on PWB (β = 0.257, t = 5.306, p = 0.000). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. Hypothesis 8 proposed that PWB has significant positive impacts on SP. Results indicate that the PWB has a significant and positive effect on Students’ performance (β = 0.627, t = 17.247, p = 0.000). As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted ( Table 8 ).

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Table 8. Hypotheses constructs.

This study proposed the mediating role of self-esteem and self-efficacy between the relationship of Music education and Students’ psychological wellbeing. Our research applied Preacher and Hayes (2008) method for mediation analysis which is the most powerful and rigorous method for mediation analysis. Hypothesis 6 proposed that SEF mediates the relationship between ME and PWB The result shows that SEF positively mediates the relationship between ME and PWB (β = 0.061, t = 2.337, p = 0.020 ) as shown in Table 8 . As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted. In Hypothesis 7, we proposed that SEF mediates the relationship between ME and PWB. Results illustrate that SEF positively mediates the relationship between ME and PWB (β = 0.129, t = 4.851, p = 0.000) as shown in Table 7 . As the value of p < 0.05, therefore this hypothesis is accepted ( Table 9 and Figure 2 ).

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Table 9. Mediation analysis.

This research revolved around certain objectives based on set goals to check the impact of music education on the wellbeing of the students psychologically and their academic performance during the most depressing moments of Pandemic. This study yielded some interesting results supporting the model of this research. The model is based on the remedial purpose of combating the depressing effects of COVID-19. Our first hypothesis was about checking the relationship between music education and Students’ psychological wellbeing, which has been previously tested and proved that music has a specific remedial effect on individuals of every walk of life. Our hypothesis was also accepted suggesting a strong relationship between psychological wellbeing and music education. These results are in accordance with many past studies such as Croom (2014) and Demirbatır (2015). The possibility of this kind of result is due to the soothing nature of music itself. In the period of online classes, socialization was limited to digital sources only, so music education was also possible over the internet. It helped in fighting the distress caused by COVID-19 during these times. The second and third hypotheses were about the impact and relationship of music education with self-esteem and the self-efficacy of the students.

As discussed earlier in the review of literature section, many researchers including Faulkner et al. (2010) , Barbre (2013) , and Rickard et al. (2013) indicated that music education was positively related to Students’ self-esteem and self-efficacy, which leads to academic achievement and the psychological wellbeing of the students. Our results were in accordance with these researchers’ results due to the importance of music in developing self-esteem and a sense of self-ability in students during these pandemic times. The fourth hypothesis was about the relationship of self-esteem with the Students’ psychological wellbeing. This hypothesis was also supported in the sense of this relationship. This happens because self-esteem plays an integral role in developing a strong sense of self-confidence in psychology, which leads to the Students’ psychological wellbeing. These results are also in accordance with many past researchers reporting similar results from different perspectives ( Barbre, 2013 ; Sowislo and Orth, 2013 ).

The relationship of Students’ self-efficacy with psychological wellbeing also resulted in the same outcomes as self-efficacy is also associated with the Students’ self-esteem and it leads to Students’ psychological wellbeing during his pandemic. These results are in agreement with ( Bandura et al., 2003 ; Siddiqui, 2015 ). The hypotheses about the mediating roles of self-esteem and self-efficacy were also accepted between the relationships of music education and the psychological wellbeing of the students. As it is well established that both self-esteem and self-efficacy had and have a strong relationship in positively improving the psychological wellbeing of the students, so the mediating role between music learning and the wellbeing of students psychologically was understood to play a significant role due to the nature of them. These results were in accordance with many past researchers who analyzed the mediating roles of both self-esteem and the self-efficacy of the students ( Molero et al., 2018 ; Sabouripour et al., 2021 ).

The last hypothesis was about the relationship of the psychological wellbeing of the students with their academic performance. It is a well-understood concept that if a student is psychologically active, efficient, and has good mental wellbeing then it would result in excellent performance, leading to distinction in academic performance. Psychological wellbeing is directly related to elevated grades or academic achievement. The last hypothesis yielded the same results and confirmed the results of many researchers in the past such as Bhullar et al. (2014) and Roslan et al. (2017) . The results obtained through this study are a great indicator of teaching music at institutes for developing better psychological wellbeing of the students to achieve improved academic performance from students.

Theoretical Contributions

This study contributes to the body of literature in a significant way. First, only very limited previous studies have examined the cause and effects of the student psychological and mental health, especially during crises. Recently, coronavirus has affected every part of society, so like others, students were also affected badly so there was a dire need to explore this topic and present solid solutions to mitigate the anxiety, stress, and burnout among undergraduate and graduate students. This study reveals that music education plays a vital role in improving Students’ psychological wellbeing, which ultimately leads to improving the Students’ performance. This study conceptualizes self-determination theory, self-esteem theory, and social cognitive theory to investigate the conceptualized path. The finding of this study reveals that music education develops self-efficacy and self-esteem in the students which assists them in improving their psychological wellbeing.

Practical Contributions

The results of this study can assist policymakers and practitioners in realizing the importance of music education in the curriculum of undergraduate and graduate students, which has long-lasting impacts on their psychological wellbeing and practical life, so there is a dire need to include music education in the curriculum. In addition to this, results show that self-efficacy and self-esteem also play a vital role in improving Students’ psychological wellbeing, so educational institutions should make their efforts to develop a sense of self-esteem and self-efficacy through their curriculum, training, and other means. Proper training should be provided to teachers of education institutes to help the students mitigate the issues of anxiety, stress, and depression, which are the main obstacles for students to become successful in their academic and professional lives.

Limitation and Future Direction

Besides the contribution of this study, there are some limitations of this study that could be mitigated in future studies to attain better results. First, the sampling technique adopted for this study is the convenience sampling technique, so future studies should adopt any other rigorous sampling technique. The sample size of this study was very small due to the lockdown enforced by the government to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic. This study was cross-sectional in nature so future studies should adopt time-series studies to get better results. Future researchers should explore other factors that may assist in improving psychological wellbeing as well as other impacts and consequences of music education. Future studies should explore other mediators and moderators in the relationship between music education and psychological wellbeing.

Recent scientific studies reveal the effects of pandemic and its associated illness which influence people’s mental health and psychological wellbeing. Music education and its practices are recognized as a vital tool in reducing the level of stress and anxiety among the students which has a significant impact on their personality grooming and academic performance. The main purpose of this study is to estimate the impact of music education on the psychological wellbeing and academic performance of students. This study also investigates the mediating role of self-esteem and self-efficacy between this relationship. This study adopts the theoretical lens of social cognitive, self-esteem theory, and self-determination theory to explain the proposed model of this study. This study is quantitative in nature and data of this study was collected from 319 students who are studying in undergraduate and graduate institutions by using self-administered questionaries. Convenience sampling was used in the data collection. PLS-SEM technique was used for data analysis. The results show that music education has a significant impact on Students’ psychological wellbeing and academic performance. Self-esteem and self-efficacy mediate the relationship between music education and psychological wellbeing. Results of this research study contribute to the body of literature on music education and psychological wellbeing and explore new avenues for future studies. Policy-makers and practitioners should promote music education in educational institutes to improve Students’ psychological wellbeing and academic performance.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

Ethics Statement

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by the Xihua University, China. The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.

Author Contributions

JS contributed in all tasks of writing of draft and data collection etc.

Conflict of Interest

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Keywords : psychological wellbeing, self-cognition theory, self-determination theory, music education, self-esteem, self-efficacy, pandemic

Citation: Sun J (2022) Exploring the Impact of Music Education on the Psychological and Academic Outcomes of Students: Mediating Role of Self-Efficacy and Self-Esteem. Front. Psychol. 13:841204. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.841204

Received: 22 December 2021; Accepted: 10 January 2022; Published: 08 February 2022.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2022 Sun. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Jian Sun, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

EU AI Act: first regulation on artificial intelligence

The use of artificial intelligence in the EU will be regulated by the AI Act, the world’s first comprehensive AI law. Find out how it will protect you.

A man faces a computer generated figure with programming language in the background

As part of its digital strategy , the EU wants to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) to ensure better conditions for the development and use of this innovative technology. AI can create many benefits , such as better healthcare; safer and cleaner transport; more efficient manufacturing; and cheaper and more sustainable energy.

In April 2021, the European Commission proposed the first EU regulatory framework for AI. It says that AI systems that can be used in different applications are analysed and classified according to the risk they pose to users. The different risk levels will mean more or less regulation. Once approved, these will be the world’s first rules on AI.

Learn more about what artificial intelligence is and how it is used

What Parliament wants in AI legislation

Parliament’s priority is to make sure that AI systems used in the EU are safe, transparent, traceable, non-discriminatory and environmentally friendly. AI systems should be overseen by people, rather than by automation, to prevent harmful outcomes.

Parliament also wants to establish a technology-neutral, uniform definition for AI that could be applied to future AI systems.

Learn more about Parliament’s work on AI and its vision for AI’s future

AI Act: different rules for different risk levels

The new rules establish obligations for providers and users depending on the level of risk from artificial intelligence. While many AI systems pose minimal risk, they need to be assessed.

Unacceptable risk

Unacceptable risk AI systems are systems considered a threat to people and will be banned. They include:

  • Cognitive behavioural manipulation of people or specific vulnerable groups: for example voice-activated toys that encourage dangerous behaviour in children
  • Social scoring: classifying people based on behaviour, socio-economic status or personal characteristics
  • Biometric identification and categorisation of people
  • Real-time and remote biometric identification systems, such as facial recognition

Some exceptions may be allowed for law enforcement purposes. “Real-time” remote biometric identification systems will be allowed in a limited number of serious cases, while “post” remote biometric identification systems, where identification occurs after a significant delay, will be allowed to prosecute serious crimes and only after court approval.

AI systems that negatively affect safety or fundamental rights will be considered high risk and will be divided into two categories:

1) AI systems that are used in products falling under the EU’s product safety legislation . This includes toys, aviation, cars, medical devices and lifts.

2) AI systems falling into specific areas that will have to be registered in an EU database:

  • Management and operation of critical infrastructure
  • Education and vocational training
  • Employment, worker management and access to self-employment
  • Access to and enjoyment of essential private services and public services and benefits
  • Law enforcement
  • Migration, asylum and border control management
  • Assistance in legal interpretation and application of the law.

All high-risk AI systems will be assessed before being put on the market and also throughout their lifecycle.

General purpose and generative AI

Generative AI, like ChatGPT, would have to comply with transparency requirements:

  • Disclosing that the content was generated by AI
  • Designing the model to prevent it from generating illegal content
  • Publishing summaries of copyrighted data used for training

High-impact general-purpose AI models that might pose systemic risk, such as the more advanced AI model GPT-4, would have to undergo thorough evaluations and any serious incidents would have to be reported to the European Commission.

Limited risk

Limited risk AI systems should comply with minimal transparency requirements that would allow users to make informed decisions. After interacting with the applications, the user can then decide whether they want to continue using it. Users should be made aware when they are interacting with AI. This includes AI systems that generate or manipulate image, audio or video content, for example deepfakes.

On December 9 2023, Parliament reached a provisional agreement with the Council on the AI act . The agreed text will now have to be formally adopted by both Parliament and Council to become EU law. Before all MEPs have their say on the agreement, Parliament’s internal market and civil liberties committees will vote on it.

More on the EU’s digital measures

  • Cryptocurrency dangers and the benefits of EU legislation
  • Fighting cybercrime: new EU cybersecurity laws explained
  • Boosting data sharing in the EU: what are the benefits?
  • EU Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act
  • Five ways the European Parliament wants to protect online gamers
  • Artificial Intelligence Act

Related articles

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This section features overview and background articles for the general public. Press releases and materials for news media are available in the news section .

Call for Papers: Aleksanteri Conference 2024

 resisting authoritarianism in eurasia civil society and new solidarities | 23–25 october 2024.

All of these spheres –  political contestation, social movements, political legitimacy, repression, and cultural resistance – reflect the formation and transformation of solidarities in the turbulent times, disruption of previously existing identities in the context of ongoing war in Ukraine and emergence of new ones.

The upcoming conference aims to explore political transformations in Eurasia from the perspective of various actors and institutions, with a particular emphasis on civil society organizations and political resistance. The conference will focus both on developments within authoritarian states and on how democracies have confronted the challenges posed by authoritarianism, including by resorting to armed resistance.

By addressing issues related to authoritarian resilience and spillover in the present and past, as well as themes such as legitimacy, civil resistance in times of war, and oppression, the conference seeks to shed light on the reshaping of political alliances and solidarities in the new era. It also aims to examine the cultural and historical origins of dictatorial as well as pluralistic regimes. Furthermore, the conference aims to explore how cultural, economic, and political attitudes have changed in times of profound crisis.

Deadline for submitting panel, roundtable, and paper proposals: 7 May 2024  

  • Call for Papers opens: Friday, 16 February 2024
  • Deadline for submitting proposals: Tuesday, 7 May 2024
  • Notification of acceptance: Monday, 10 June 2024
  • Early bird (130 €): Sunday, 30 June 2024
  • Standard (170 €): Friday, 6 September 2024
  • Conference programme published: late September 2024
  • Conference: 23–25 October 2024

Submit your proposal by 7 May 2024

EU Poised to Fine Apple About 500 Million Euros, FT Reports

Reuters

FILE PHOTO: The Apple logo is seen hanging at the entrance to the Apple store on 5th Avenue in Manhattan, New York, U.S., October 16, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File Photo

(Reuters) -The European Union is set to fine Apple about 500 million euros ($539 million) over alleged breaches of EU competition law, the Financial Times reported on Sunday citing unnamed sources.

The fine is expected to be announced early next month, the FT said.

Last year, the European Commission accused Apple of distorting competition in the music streaming market via App Store rules that prevent developers from informing users of other purchasing options.

Both the European Commission and Apple declined to comment on the FT report.

($1 = 0.9282 euros)

(Reporting by Chandni Shah in BengaluruEditing by David Goodman and Lisa Shumaker)

Copyright 2024 Thomson Reuters .

Tags: United States , European Union , music , Europe

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  1. Journal of Research in Music Education: Sage Journals

    First published Jan 7, 2024 2024 Call for Applications for the JRME Editorial Committee Restricted access Research article First published Dec 30, 2023 Composer Diversity in State Music Lists: An Exploratory Analysis Cory D. Meals View onlinefirst articles View latest issues You might be interested in Authors will enjoy:

  2. A Review of the Literature on the Relationship of Music Education to

    This paper undertakes to explore the literature about the connections between music education and social-emotional skill development. For the collection and analysis of information, online sources of peer-reviewed scientific journals in addition to the university library were used.

  3. PDF How Music Education Helps Students Learn, Achieve, and Succeed Music

    1. Improves recall and retention of verbal information 2. Advances math achievement 3. Boosts reading and English language arts (ELA) skills 4. Improves average SAT scores Music education develops the creative capacities for lifelong success 1. Sharpens student attentiveness 2. Strengthens perseverance 3. Equips students to be creative 4.

  4. Full article: The digital 'turn' in music education (editorial)

    Volume 23, Issue 2 Music Education Research Volume 23, 2021 - Issue 2: Special Issue: The digital 'turn' in music education Open access 10,118 Views 8 CrossRef citations to date 0 Altmetric Listen Editorial The digital 'turn' in music education (editorial) David A. Camlin & Tania Lisboa Pages 129-138 | Published online: 02 Apr 2021

  5. Journal of Research in Music Education on JSTOR

    The Journal of Research in Music Education (JRME) is a quarterly publication of music education research studies published by the Society for Research in Music Education of MENC: The National Association for Music Education. About 24 scientific and historical studies are published annually in the 96-page journal. The publication is aimed primarily at music education researchers and those who ...

  6. Music Education Research: Vol 25, No 5 (Current issue)

    Music Education Research, Volume 25, Issue 5 (2023) See all volumes and issues. Volume 25, 2023 Vol 24, 2022 Vol 23, 2021 Vol 22, 2020 Vol 21, 2019 Vol 20, 2018 Vol 19, 2017 Vol 18, 2016 Vol 17, 2015 Vol 16, 2014 Vol 15, 2013 Vol 14, 2012 Vol 13, 2011 Vol 12, 2010 Vol 11, 2009 Vol 10, 2008 Vol 9, 2007 Vol 8, 2006 Vol 7, 2005 Vol 6, 2004 Vol 5 ...

  7. Music Education Research

    Music Education Research is an international refereed journal which draws its contributions from a wide community of researchers. The focus is firmly on research, and the journal provides an international forum for cross-cultural investigations and discussions relating to all areas of music education.

  8. Research Studies in Music Education: Sage Journals

    SUBMIT PAPER. This internationally peer-reviewed journal, published on behalf of SEMPRE, promotes the dissemination and discussion of high quality research in music and music education. The journal encourages the interrogation and development of a range of research methodologies and their application to diverse topics in music education theory ...

  9. Exploring the Impact of Music Education on the Psychological and

    Introduction. A huge amount of scientific research shows that the pandemic and its associated illness has a significant influence on the behavoir and mental health of individuals (Loades et al., 2020; Luo et al., 2020), with only a few studies indicating contrary (Gijzen et al., 2020).Even during the month of April 2020, when most people were on lockdown due to the pandemic, mental health ...

  10. Effects of the Educational Use of Music on 3- to 12-Year-Old Children's

    Some of our modern challenges, such as constantly adapting to new scenarios or the need for team work have justified the introduction of emotional competence into educational systems, while diverse studies confirm the relationship between music and emotional intelligence, so that the former could be used as a tool to develop the latter.

  11. (PDF) The power of music: Its impact on the intellectual, social and

    It explores the evidence relating to the impact of musical skills on language development, literacy, numeracy, measures of intelligence, general attainment, creativity, fine motor co-ordination,...

  12. (PDF) Music Education and Effective Teaching: Perspectives from a

    In the past few decades numerous research studies have focused on the factors influencing the quality of music education in schools, both primary and secondary, in a South African as well as...

  13. How musical training affects cognitive development: rhythm, reward and

    Psychological and neuroscientific research demonstrates that musical training in children is associated with heightening of sound sensitivity as well as enhancement in verbal abilities and general reasoning skills.

  14. (PDF) An overview of research on music and learning

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  15. What is music education for? Understanding and fostering routes into

    Notes on contributor. Stephanie E. Pitts is Professor of Music Education at the University of Sheffield, and has research interests in lifelong musical engagement and the social psychology of music. She is the author of books including Chances and Choices: Exploring the Impact of Music Education (OUP, 2012), and Valuing Musical Participation (Ashgate, 2005).

  16. Longitudinal Research on Music Education and Child Development

    Based on a comprehensive analysis of 39 studies published in academic journals in the past decade (2010-2020), this article discusses the strengths of current research and the challenges that lie ahead for researchers interested in conducting longitudinal research on music education and child development.

  17. Making a Song and Dance About It: The Effectiveness of Teaching

    Programs that engage young children in movement and song to help them learn are popular but experimental evidence on their impact is sparse. We use an RCT to evaluate the effectiveness of Big Word Club (BWC), a classroom program that uses music and dance videos for 3-5 minutes per day to increase vocabulary.

  18. Music Education Research Papers

    Music Education 171,291 Followers Recent papers in Music Education Inside, outside, downside up: Conservatoire training and musicians' work Download by Dawn Bennett 4 Music Education , Higher Education , Employability Skills , Conservatoire training Content analysis using webQDA: methodological option to characterize a child with cerebral palsy

  19. Music education, support networks, and continuity are key factors

    More information: Anna Kuoppamäki et al, Young people navigating musical lives: Considering arts participation as agency in cultural authorship, Research Studies in Music Education (2023). DOI ...

  20. Performing Music Research: Methods in Music Education, Psychology, and

    Performing Music Research is a comprehensive guide to research in music performance. It reviews the knowledge and skills needed to critique existing studies in music education, psychology, and performance science, and to design and carry out new investigations.

  21. How technology is reinventing K-12 education

    Study finds public pension plans on shaky ground. New research calls attention to a huge funding gap and growing risk exposure, raising alarms about the long-term viability of government pensions.

  22. Music Interventions and Child Development: A Critical Review and

    This paper reviews the latest evidence on the effect of musical interventions on the development of primary school-aged children. Four electronic databases were searched from January 2010 through June 2016 using music, music instruction, music education, music lesson, music training, development, child, student, and pupil as key words for the ...

  23. (PDF) Technology in Music Education

    Technology in Music Education. November 2023 · Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l'apprentissage et de la technologie. Adita Maharaj. Akini Gill. This study ...

  24. Full article: Music in early childhood teacher education: raising

    Beatriz Ilari is Associate Professor of Music Education at the University of Southern California where she teaches graduate courses in music psychology, the sociology of music, and research methods. She has conducted extensive research with babies, preschoolers, and school-aged children.

  25. Taylor Swift: why academics are studying the pop star

    Taylor Swift is the biggest pop star in the world and a seemingly unlikely subject of academic study around Australia and the world. The American superstar made Grammys history this month winning Album of the Year for the fourth time, soon after being named Time magazine's Person of the Year.

  26. Frontiers

    All these supportive papers suggested relationships between music education and the psychological wellbeing of students, along with the self-esteem and self-efficacy of the students, so we propose the following: H 1. There is a relationship between Music education and psychological wellbeing. H 2.

  27. EU AI Act: first regulation on artificial intelligence

    As part of its digital strategy, the EU wants to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) to ensure better conditions for the development and use of this innovative technology. AI can create many benefits, such as better healthcare; safer and cleaner transport; more efficient manufacturing; and cheaper and more sustainable energy.. In April 2021, the European Commission proposed the first EU ...

  28. Call for Papers: Aleksanteri Conference 2024

    Call for Papers opens: Friday, 16 February 2024; Deadline for submitting proposals: Tuesday, 7 May 2024; Notification of acceptance: Monday, 10 June 2024; Registration fees due by: Early bird (130 €): Sunday, 30 June 2024; Standard (170 €): Friday, 6 September 2024; Conference programme published: late September 2024; Conference: 23-25 ...

  29. EU Poised to Fine Apple About 500 Million Euros, FT Reports

    (Reuters) -The European Union is set to fine Apple about 500 million euros ($539 million) over alleged breaches of EU competition law, the Financial Times reported on Sunday citing unnamed sources.