provides opportunity to increase social skills for those with anxiety
or social phobia -serves as an outlet to relieve stress
improves fine motor skills -improves memory and concentration
increases satisfaction in life and instills a sense of knowledge
teaches self-discipline
STUDIES SHOW THAT:
The real-world effects of musical training on intellectual abilities are (a) larger with longer periods of training, (b) long lasting, (c) not attributable to obvious confounding variables, and (d) distinct from those nonmusical out-of-school activities.
Music improves spatial perception and abstract reasoning.
Students who combine music lessons with special computer program score significantly higher in math skills.
Music training causes long-term enhancement of pre-school children's spatial-temporal reasoning.
Students with four or more years of music study outscore, by 82 points on the SAT, students with six months or less of music instruction.
Student reading and math scores rise significantly as a result of music enhanced curricula.
Students who study music make better grades than students who do not study music.
Music students have a lower school drop-out rate than non-music students.
Students participating in music study have better school attendance than students who do not participate.
Students involved in music have lower discipline referrals than students not involved in music.
College music majors who apply to medical school have the highest acceptance rate of any other field (66.7% acceptance rate).
Music has beneficial effects in attention capacity and memory, and distractibility.
Teaching elderly people to play musical instruments decreases anxiety, loneliness, and depression; and is critical in coping with stress, stimulating the immune system, and improving overall health.
Music provides a healthy release from damaging, pent-up emotions.
Youth involvement in arts programs significantly decreases frequency of delinquent behavior and court referrals, and increases communication skills and ability to stick to tasks from beginning to end.
(1) "Music & Cognitive Abilities" by E. Glenn Schellenberg, 2005 American Psychological Society, Vol. 14, #6
(2) "The Mozart Effect," Parade Magazine, June 14, 1998
