First Post

So as my first post I'm going to post a paper that I did for my senior project. I don't know who will read it or if they'll like it, I just know that I worked hard and did my best.

Animals Like Music Too

Hannah Metzger

            The pounding beat calls out to you from your headphones. This song hits you right to the core, like the artist knew your entire life story. You find yourself working harder, faster as if the beat was controlling your every movement, and it might be. The fact is that music reaches us on such a neurological level that it can affect our emotions and increase our productivity. I've always wondered if animals could have reactions similar to humans if stimulated by something like a series of sounds. That led me to hypothesize that animals would indeed react to sound, and that playing a series of sounds in the form of music would result in emotional changes and an increase in production levels, and would then benefit farmers.

            What do all animals have in common? We all have a brain. Just because we are different species doesn’t mean that we don’t have brains made up of the same sections, so theoretically those brains should react similarly to each other when exposed to music. According to Daniel J. Levitin in This is Your Brain on Music, music affects many different sectors of the brain¹. The Amygdala, the Nucleus Accumbens, and the Cerebellum all have direct roles in the body’s emotional reactions to music (Levitin). These sectors are responsible for you crying uncontrollably when you listen to Travelin’ Soldier¹ by the Dixie Chicks or when you have that sense of empowerment when listening to Let it Go² by. The Motor Cortex, the Sensory Cortex, the Visual Cortex, and the Cerebellum are responsible for the movements that you have and the reactions to the movements in correlation to the music (Levitin). This means that they are the reason as to why you seem to work harder and are more focused on that work when you are listening to music. Animals have these same portions to their brains (well we are animals too), so it’s logical to believe that they would feel a change in emotion and would become more productive in their tasks when exposed to music.

            We know that animals respond to sounds within their own species, the animal kingdom is filled with a network of calls and responses, it’s when outside noises enter that network do we enter a grey area. Cows that have just given birth to a calf, know their calf’s calls from all the other calves, and the calf will be able to pick out their mother’s distinct call. When the cow and calf hear a sound, like an unfamiliar vehicle, they either band together to protect their young, or they flee from the unknown. I talked to a local farmer that has been a farmer all of his life, and he told me that it was the dynamic of the sound, the emotion put behind it, and the movements going with the sound, that all contribute to how the animals react. After a while an animal will begin associating the noise with an outcome, such as when a pig learns the sounds a farmer makes when they are about to be fed. Not all noises will result in a reaction from an animal, and we never know when or how an animal will respond to an outside noise.

In my pursuit of proving that all animals have some sort of emotional and physical reaction to music, I came up with the idea of playing different types of music for egg laying chickens to see if it would relax them and they would produce more eggs. I played three different types of music to my bus driver’s chickens in the hope that the experiment would prove my hypothesis. For the first two days I played classical music³ and indeed the egg count did increase from fifteen eggs a day to sixteen and seventeen eggs. The third and fourth days I played jazz⁴ to them thinking that it would also relax them and increase their egg count, the outcome that occurred I would have never expected. The chickens lay fourteen eggs both days, but that wasn’t the weird part; these chickens had been laying only brown eggs for about two years and nothing in their environment changed except the introduction of different types of music, but while playing jazz for them their eggs began to have a purple tint to them that became more and more apparent. My thought is that the gloomy tone to the jazz depressed the chickens so much that there was a chemical reaction with the pigment of the eggs. Finally for the fifth and sixth days I played country/folk music⁵ for the chickens, thinking that this music would decrease the egg count further, if not changing the color once more. Again I was surprised in the outcome, the chickens lay sixteen and seventeen eggs, like with the classical music, but the eggs were still a pretty shade of light purple. The purple tint to the egg shells seems to be permanent, but the chickens are no worse for wear, if anything they’ve been happier since going through the ordeal. Now I know that chickens like classical and country/folk music, and never to play jazz for them because it decreased their productivity and upset them greatly.⁶

            Some people say that animals can’t feel emotions because they are too different from humans. This is an ignorant way of thinking, because anything with a brain has the capability to emote. Yes humans have the most complex of the brains because of the sheer amount of neurons and connections, but all brains have the same basic regions; regions that associate some sounds as safe and others as dangerous or unknown. It is true that animals may feel fewer emotions than humans, but according to Charles Darwin, “the first scientist to study animal emotions systematically,” (Bakoff) there are six universal emotions (emotions felt by every animal): anger, happiness, sadness, disgust, fear, and surprise. Yes there are more emotions, however, the complexity of these emotions result from how many neurons and neuron connections are in the brain. So how does sound play into this? Emotions are the result of the stimulating of the five senses: sight, smell, taste, touch, and sound (Leone). This means that a sound can indeed trigger an emotional reaction.

            According to my experiment and research, my conclusion is that playing music for animals results in an increase in production and a significant emotional response. It just goes to show that humans aren’t the only one that music effects. Pay attention farmers, playing music could increase your profits!

                Levitin, Daniel. "Appendix A." This is Your Brain of Music. New York: Penguin Group Inc, 2006. . Print.

¹ “Travelin’ Soldier” Dixie Chicks “Home” 2002 Sony Music Entertainment Inc track three

² “Let it Go” Idina Menzel “Frozen Soundtrack” 2013 Walt Disney track five

³ “Great Classics for Reading II” Disc three 2005 HNH Int. Ltd. 2005 Somerset Entertainment Ltd., Toronto ON

⁴ UofL “Jamey Aebersold Jazz Studies Program”

⁵ Dixie Chicks “Home” 2002 Sony Music Entertainment Inc

⁶ Since hearing of my experiment, many other farmers that raise egg-laying chickens have begun playing different types of music for them and I hope to hear of their results soon.

Bakoff, Marc. "Animal Odd Couples Excerpt: The Emotional Lives of Animals." Nature. Nature. Web. 28 May 2014. <http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/animal-odd-couples/excerpt-the-emotional-lives-of-animals/8005/>.

Leone, Cathrine. "Come to Your Senses." International Interior Design Association. International Interior Design Association, n.d. Web. 28 May 2014. <http://www.iida.org/content.cfm/come-to-your-senses>.

Photos

Wolchover, Natalie. Pets Prefer to Pick Their Own Music. 2012. Photograph. Bunny’s BlogWeb. 28 May 2014. <http://bunnyjeancook.blogspot.com/2012/03/pets-prefer-to-pick-their-own-music.html>.

Anita, Rena. Fertile and Table Chicken Eggs for Sale. N.d. Photograph. 21 Food, Hungary. Web. 28 May 2014. <http://www.21food.com/products/fertile-and-table-chicken-eggs-for-sale-756377.html>.

Barnig, Marco. Human Brain Parts and Regions. 2013. Photograph. Internet with a BrainWeb. 28 May 2014. <http://www.web3.lu/human-brain-parts-and-regions/>.