How Music Triggers Reward and Joy in the Brain
When we listen to music we love, our brains release dopamine, a “feel-good” chemical that creates a sense of reward. This release happens in two stages: first, in anticipation of what’s coming next in the music, and then, during moments of intense emotional response to the music itself. Essentially, music can spark feelings of euphoria and even a craving for more, similar to how other rewarding experiences affect our brains.
Research shows that the brain’s “reward center,” called the striatum, plays a key role here. Using brain scans, scientists found that one part of this reward center, the caudate, becomes more active as we anticipate the music, while another part, the nucleus accumbens, lights up during powerful emotional moments in the music. Interestingly, this means our brains use slightly different pathways for the thrill of anticipation and for the pleasure we feel during peak emotional experiences in music.
These findings reveal that music’s ability to deeply move us is linked to how it engages our brain’s reward system. This may help explain why music holds such a unique place in human culture: it brings us together by creating powerful, shared emotional experiences that feel incredibly rewarding.
How Dopamine Shapes Our Musical Pleasure
Dopamine, the brain’s “reward chemical,” plays a big role in making music feel enjoyable. But how exactly does the brain turn a sequence of sounds into a rewarding experience? This is a question researchers are digging into to understand why music affects us so deeply.
Past studies struggled to fully explain how dopamine creates musical pleasure, hinting that it might work indirectly. Now, scientists are exploring a fresh approach: music may follow a “pleasure cycle,” which includes stages of wanting (or expectation), liking, and learning. Expectation is crucial in music’s appeal—whether a melody goes as expected or takes a surprising twist, it can be rewarding.
After anticipation, “liking” is the next stage, when we experience immediate enjoyment from the music. Following that, there’s “learning,” where our brains take in these rewarding experiences to guide future listening. Dopamine neurons in the brain keep track of our expectations and respond to surprising moments in the music, treating it like a signal to pay attention. This complex dance between dopamine and music is what makes listening such a rich and layered experience, showing us that the relationship between music and reward is more intricate than it seems.
The Role of Dopamine in Musical Anticipation and Pleasure
When we listen to music, dopamine, the brain’s reward chemical, kicks in to enhance our anticipation and enjoyment. While we know dopamine is linked to the pleasure we get from music, scientists are still piecing together exactly how this anticipation affects the brain’s reward system.
In one study by Steinkeis et al. (2006), researchers found that dopamine plays a complex role. They discovered that our expectations of harmony—whether a note or chord feels “right” or surprising—can strongly influence our emotional reaction to music. While dopamine is important, recent studies suggest it might not be the sole factor in musical pleasure. Even when dopamine activity is reduced in certain brain areas, people can still find music enjoyable.
The study also found that dopamine pathways in the brain fire consistently when we listen to ambiguous or unpredictable music, helping us learn and adapt to new musical patterns. Dopamine helps us engage with music by balancing our expectations with what we actually hear, making music even more pleasurable when our brains are pleasantly surprised. This shows that music can activate the brain’s reward system more intensely when we can both predict and be surprised by the melody, leading to an even stronger dopamine response.
Understanding How Music Becomes Rewarding
To truly grasp how music becomes a source of pleasure, it helps to look at how the brain’s reward networks predict and process musical sounds. Scientists distinguish two kinds of “prediction errors” related to music: reward prediction error, which involves our expectations of how emotionally rewarding music will be, and prediction error, the brain’s response to surprises in the music itself.
Unlike more direct pleasures like food or a favorite drink, the pleasure of music is harder to measure. Music relies on a unique relationship between what we learn about a piece as we listen and how the music changes over time. This interplay of learning and anticipation helps music reach its emotional peak, or “height.”
Dopamine neurons in the brain track more than just expected rewards; they also gauge the size, timing, probability, and surprises of each reward, as well as how noticeable or “salient” it is. This makes dopamine an essential player in the way we experience musical pleasure, responding to both our expectations and the unexpected twists in a piece of music.
Sources
Salimpoor,Valorie et al. Anatomically distinct dopamine release during anticipation and experience of peak emotion to music. Nature Neuroscience; 14(2): 257-285. 2011.
Blum, Kenneth et al. Hypothesizing Music Intervention Enhances Brain Functional Connectivity Involving Dopaminergic Recruitment: Common Neuro-correlates to Abusable Drugs. Mol Neurobiol; 54(5):3753-3758. 2017.
Gebaur, Line et al. Ever-Changing Cycles of Musical Pleasure: The Role of Dopamine and Anticipation. Psychomusicology; 22(2): 152-167. 2012.
Hansen, Niels et al. Commentary: Predictions and the brain: how musical sounds become rewarding. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience; 11: 1-3. 2017.
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