There is hardly anyone who dislikes music. It is the medium that soothes our mind, refreshes, provides comfort, entertains us and even cures us from illness. Music is the essential component of our life and well being.
Music is very much related to our health and to be more specific, it has direct effects on the development of our brain. A child can hear sounds right from the mother’s womb. Doctors suggest expecting mothers to listen to soothing music so that the baby inside her body stays well. The sense of sound is completely developed when a child is born. The nature of music that a child gets to hear right from the beginning plays a great role in determining the basic nature of the person. The first three years of the life is most important for the development of the brain. The brain weight of a new born is just 25% of the total body weight and by the age of three years, this percentage grows dramatically with the building of the pathways and connections known as synapses. Synapses used for classical music are same as those used for the skills necessary for mathematics. So, listening to classical music actually enhances the brain’s ability to solve mathematical problems!
The exposure to music at an early age has proved to improve the cognitive abilities of a person. The researches show that the pre-school kids who take music lessons perform better at the spatial and temporal reasoning tasks as compared to those who receive computer lessons. Listening to classical music has the temporary benefits while getting systematic musical instructions or lessons have long lasting effects because the lessons result in developing new pathways in the brain.
The brain of an infant is not completely developed at the time of birth and the child needs sensory inputs for the brain cells to get built and well connected. Music is able to provide the auditory means of stimulation necessary for the development and at the same time is able to carry the educational concepts, like language, that will finally help an infant to develop the cognitive skills.
As said earlier, an infant can percept the music right from the mother’s womb, classical music proves to be the better option that helps in the development of the child’s brain as compared to the rock and roll tunes. Classical music is complex in structure, harmony as well as instrumentation and it thus primes the brain with the pathways necessary for the cognitive tasks. Music helps to build the musical pathways in the brain and creates the environment in which the infant can relax. Music increases the volume of the brain and also contributes to the strengthening of the communication between the different areas of the brain.
