Listening to Mozart was reported to raise spatial-reasoning scores briefly.
The 1993 report described a temporary improvement on a paper-folding task lasting minutes. It became state policy in places — free classical recordings for newborns — on the strength of a claim the paper did not make. Later work suggests any effect is arousal and mood rather than Mozart.
In practice
- A nursery plays classical music at nap time and reports it as an intervention.
- A finding about one task in adults for ten minutes is legislated for as a claim about children's development.
- Possible explanations
- The best-supported explanation is arousal and mood: any enjoyable stimulus that raises alertness briefly improves performance on some tasks, and the music is incidental.
- In its favour
- The original experiment was real and carefully reported, and the arousal mechanism it turned out to demonstrate is itself a genuine finding.
- Against it
- The effect was small, lasted minutes and applied to one spatial task; meta-analysis finds little support, and the popular claim that it raises intelligence in children has no basis.
- Standing
- The original effect was small, short-lived and confined to one spatial task; meta-analysis found little support, and the popular claim that it raises intelligence in children was never made by the original study.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Learning & Education
- Essay
- What works in learning, and what schools can and cannot change