The mononymous Irish vocalist known as Bono once said, “Music can change the world because it can change people.” Then again, if that music is forced onto your phone one day by Apple and U2, as was the case with the release of Songs Of Innocence in 2014, people aren’t going to be too happy. Generally, however, he’s right: music can change people and it can bring everyone closer together. Benefit concerts like Live Aid, Rock For The Rainforest, and the Tibetan Freedom Concert have all been wonderful examples of music making the world a better place.
Recently, Sonos (a manufacturer of hi-fi home audio systems) wanted to understand exactly how music affects people during their daily lives. (Not for any sort of marketing and consumer research purposes, surely.) In conjunction with Apple Music and neuroscientist Daniel Levitin, the company conducted a fairly thorough study (entitled Music Makes It Home) and the results are pretty interesting.
To start, they polled 30,000 music listeners and asked them to “talk about how they feel about music.” Afterward, they conducted an experiment in 30 individual homes around the world. As reported by Fast Company, “For one week, the members of each household didn’t listen to any music out loud. The following week, they did.” The researchers used Sonos sound systems, Apple Watches, iBeacons, and Nest cams to see what changed when music (of the families’ own choosing) was played in the house.
Here are a few of the more fascinating findings:
- 58 percent said music makes food taste better.
- Music makes you 12 percent calmer, 24 percent less crabby, and 25 percent more inspired.
- Couples who played music out loud in the home had 66 percent more sex.
- 83 percent believe doing chores is easier when listening to music.
- The average distance between people while listening to music decreased by 12 percent.
- 24 percent would rather give up sex than give up listening to music.
- 16 percent felt more loved when music was played out loud.
- Homes with music are 15 percent more likely to laugh together.
- 33 percent suspect their partner has lied about liking a certain type of music to appear more attractive.
- 39 percent of people enjoy listening to music more than they like sex.