"Mozart Effect" Debunked

Remember the popular idea that listening to Mozart’s music could make you smarter? Well, it turns out that it’s total bunk.

The “Mozart Effect” was the name given to a phenomenon studied by psychologist Francis Rauscher and physicist Gordon Shaw that involved subjects listening to Mozart and taking spatial-reasoning tests just after the listening sessions. Results were published in a paper in 1993 which found a correlation between listening sessions and better scores on these tests. The big draw for this seemingly esoteric bit of experimentation was the fact that these positive test results made a difference in terms of IQ points. 

Of course, it’s not that far of a leap (though it IS a leap) to start claiming that you’ll be smarter if you listen to Mozart. This has indeed happened in terms of conventional wisdom: After this study was widely popularized, it became important to play Mozart for unborn babies, make kids listen to classical music before big test days, etc. Now it’s not my intention to make fun of anyone who did these things – I certainly fell for the “leap” as well. (Though it should be added that it doesn’t hurt to expose young’uns to classical music.) I can remember hearing friends or parents of students talking about putting on “Mozart music” for his/her unborn infant, and I would say something like, “Great – there seems to be a good amount of evidence to support that kind of activity.” And then we could wait a few years to see if the A’s would start rolling in when they got to school…

But just recently, the German government decided to get to the bottom of the “Mozart Effect” case by supporting a substantial examination of the ME literature. The team of nine researchers (all of whom possess musical expertise in addition to their other qualifications) could find no real evidence that passive listening to Mozart makes you any smarter over the long-term. In fact, there are apparently many different things you could do before a cognitive test (like hearing stories) that have exactly the same effect in the immediate short term (e.g., 15-20 minutes) as listening to Mozart’s music. To be fair to Rauscher, she herself has noted that misconceptions about her study typically confuse limited (and temporary) improvement in specific mental tasks with a general increase in an individual’s IQ (see Rauscher’s quote in the Wikipedia article on the Mozart Effect). There have also been others who have disputed the claims of the more popular versions of the Mozart Effect (many skeptics have written on the issue before the German report).

The German researchers, however, stipulate that active participation in musical activities (such as playing an instrument and taking lessons) may or may not improve IQ over the long-term and more studies need to be done to determine this for sure. For those of you who have followed some of my posts about the benefits of musical training, you know that I am interested in the findings of this kind of research. Many studies have been done which show strong evidence for the “side-benefits” of musical training, such as promotion of intellectual development (this study actually supports IQ-sharpening!), memory enhancement, and the positive effects on different kinds of success. But despite a few important studies on the issue, the jury is really still out when it comes to improving general IQ through musical training.

The “Mozart Effect” may be in its grave (at least in terms of long-term IQ enhancement), but we’ll have to wait and see if any “Musical Training Effect” can permanently pump up someone’s IQ. Time will tell.