聽流行音樂為什麼讓人愉悅？科學家找到原因了

心情不好的時候，為什麼聽首流行歌曲就能讓自己感覺好一點？這個問題，終於有了答案。

Photo by Alireza Attari on Unsplash

Have you ever wondered why certain pop songs just make you feel so good?

你可曾好奇過為什麼某些流行歌曲會讓你感覺這麼愉快？

Researchers studying the question found that the right combination of uncertainty and surprise is what gives listeners the most pleasure.

研究人員發現，恰到好處地融合不確定和驚奇因素是讓傾聽者感到愉悅的原因。

The study, published in the journal Current Biology, involved an analysis of 80,000 chords in 745 pop songs from the US Billboard "Hot 100" chart between 1958 and 1991.

發表在《當代生物學》期刊上的這項研究分析了1958年到1991年間美國公告牌百強單曲榜上的745首流行歌曲中的8萬組和弦。

The researchers—from institutes in Germany, Norway, Denmark and the UK—used a machine-learning model to quantify the level of uncertainty and surprise of these chords, and then asked 39 adult volunteers to rate how pleasurable they found each series of chords.

來自德國、挪威、丹麥和英國科研機構的研究人員用一種機器學習模型把這些和弦中的不確定和驚奇因素量化了，並請39名成年志願者給每組和弦帶來的愉悅程度打分。

Each song was stripped of its melody and lyrics so that only chord progressions were left and the results couldn't be skewed by other associations to the songs that listeners might have had.

每首歌都去掉了旋律和歌詞，只留下和弦進行曲式，這樣結果便不會因為歌曲其他元素可能給聽眾造成的影響而偏離。

skew [skjuː]: v. 偏離，歪斜；扭轉，偏轉；歪曲

They found two things: that participants derived greater pleasure when they were relatively certain what would happen next but then were surprised by an unexpected chord progression.

研究人員發現了兩件事。第一，參與者在比較確定接下來要出現的和弦卻聽到意外的和弦進行曲式時會有更大的愉悅感。

However, the same number of participants found it pleasant when they were uncertain as to what would follow, and then the subsequent chords were more familiar to them.

然而，同樣數量的參與者表示，當他們不確定接下來要出現的和弦，卻聽到了比較熟悉的和弦曲式，也會感到愉悅。

Photo by Jan Střecha on Unsplash

"It is fascinating that humans can derive pleasure from a piece of music just by how sounds are ordered over time," Vincent Cheung, the lead researcher on the paper from the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Germany, said in a statement.

該研究的首席研究員、來自德國馬克斯普朗克人類認知與腦科學研究所的文森特·張在一份聲明中說：「令人着迷的是，人類僅憑聲音的組合順序就可以從一首樂曲中得到快感。」

"Songs that we find pleasant are likely those which strike a good balance between knowing what is going to happen next and surprising us with something we did not expect. Understanding how music activates our pleasure system in the brain could explain why listening to music might help us feel better when we are feeling blue."

「讓我們感覺愉快的歌曲通常是那些在預期接下來會聽到的和弦和意外聽到的和弦之間保持巧妙平衡的歌曲。理解音樂如何激活我們大腦中的快樂系統可以解釋，為什麼聽音樂可以在我們情緒低落時讓我們感覺好起來。」

Cheung told CNN that pleasure in music is linked to expectancy. Previous studies had looked into the effects of surprise on pleasure, but he and his colleagues' study also focused on the uncertainty of listeners' predictions.

張研究員告訴CNN說，音樂帶來的愉悅感和預期有關。先前的研究調查了驚奇對愉悅感的效果，但他和同事的研究還關注了聽眾預期的不確定性。

The songs used in the experiments included James Taylor's "Country Roads," UB40's "Red, Red Wine" and The Beatles' "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da."

用於實驗的歌曲包括詹姆斯·泰勒的《Country Roads》、UB40樂隊的《Red, Red Wine》和甲殼蟲樂隊的《Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da》。

Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash

The findings may help improve artificial musical algorithms and could help composers write music or predict musical trends.

研究結果可能有助於改進人工音樂算法，幫助作曲家編曲或預測音樂潮流。

"The idea is that hopefully as a scientist analyzing these patterns of pleasure in humans, you can somehow work out where music can go next," Peter Harrison, a researcher at Queen Mary University, London, who worked on the project, told CNN.

參與該項目的倫敦瑪麗女王大學的研究員皮特·哈瑞森告訴CNN說：「我們希望，科學家通過分析人類的快樂模式可以預期音樂的走向。」

As part of the same experiment, the researchers also used brain imaging to locate the areas of the brain reflected in musical pleasure.

作為實驗的一部分，研究人員還用腦成像技術鎖定了產生音樂愉悅感的大腦區域。

They found the regions involved were the amygdala, the hippocampus and the auditory cortex, which process emotions, learning and memory, and sound, respectively.

他們發現，這些相關大腦區域是杏仁核、海馬體和聽覺皮層，它們分別處理情緒、學習和記憶、聲音。

Cheung added that another part of the brain, the nucleus accumbens -- which processes reward expectations -- was perhaps responsible for "directing our attention towards the music so that we will try to find out what will happen next."

張研究員補充道，大腦的另一個處理獎勵期望的部位——伏核——也許是「將我們的注意力引向音樂」的組織，「這樣我們就會試着去弄清楚接下來會發生什麼」。

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來源： 中國日報網雙語新聞