Do you like to be aurally aroused? A new study confirms that listening to new music stimulates the same pleasure response in the brain as having sex. The scientists were studying brain activity in an effort to predict people’s music buying patterns.
“What makes music so emotionally powerful is the creation of expectations. Activity in the nucleus accumbens is an indicator that expectations were met or surpassed, and in our study we found the more activity we see in this brain area while people are listening to music, the more money they are willing to spend.”
The article notes that this is similar to what happens in the brain during other pleasurable activities.
Similar connections were also seen between the nucleus accumbens and other brain areas involved in high level sequencing, complex pattern recognition and assigning emotional and reward value to stimuli.
In other words, the brain assigns value to music through the ancient reward circuitry of dopamine which reinforces behaviours absolutely necessary for our survival – such as eating and sex.
These connections might explain the popularity of adult toys like the Club Vibe and Better than Chocolate which convert music into pleasurable vibrations and also why certain songs just seem to put us in the mood.
