Article: Higher empathy people get more joy out of music, study finds

 Sure - I’d buy that.

 

"‘High-empathy and low-empathy people share a lot in common when listening to music,’ he says. That includes ‘roughly equivalent involvement in the regions of the brain related to auditory, emotion, and sensory-motor processing.’

But there’s one major difference when it comes to listening to music. An empathetic person’s brains shows more involvement of social circuitry when listening to tunes, such as the areas that light up when feeling compassion for others.

‘This may indicate that music is being perceived weakly as a kind of social entity. As an imagined or virtual human presence,’ offers Wallmark. This enhancement gives empathetic folks a more pleasure when listening to music."

(Via Higher empathy people get more joy out of music, study finds.)

And speaking of joy in music: 

"‘In terms of imaging we have captured from the brain, studies have shown that listening to music activates multiple parts simultaneously, which corresponds to far more parts than any other stimulus produces in humans.’

The fact that music activates so many brain systems at once is why it makes it so sweeping and pleasurable. Music exerts its deepest effect on the emotional nucleus of the brain, the limbic system.

The most amazing thing is that music automatically activates areas of the brain that are essential to feelings of pleasure and reward. So much so that the same pleasure centers of the brain that become active when we listen to our favorite tunes are exactly the same as those that are linked when humans eat chocolate or have … sex!"

(Via Why Music Brings Pleasure: Demystified - MTT - Music Think Tank.)