Has there ever been a time when the mental health of our young has caused greater concern?
Things were bad enough before the world went crazy, with around 10% of teenagers identified as having probable mental health problems.
This figure rose rapidly to 17% for the under-16s and worse still for 17 to 18-year-olds in the early days of the pandemic (ONS, 2020). Reports of depression and anxiety and increasing referrals to CAMHS have continued through the pandemic, and doubtless the war in Ukraine and the current economic crisis will have exacerbated problems (Ford et al, 2021; Commission on Young Lives, 2022).
The solution to this is far from clear. CAMHS is overwhelmed, with long waiting lists and referrals being refused even for some who are suicidal (Commission on Young Lives, 2022). Does this mean that we are failing many thousands of the young?
Expert opinion is more nuanced. It may be that we presently over-medicalise emotional issues in the young. Is it mental disorder to be depressed and anxious in the face of a pandemic, a war in Europe, widespread economic distress, climate disasters, climate change – or are such emotions normal, natural responses, even though they are unpleasant?
Obviously, where an individual’s reactions meet the criteria for a diagnosable mental disorder (PTSD, for instance, or OCD, anorexia, autism) or whose anxiety or depression is so overwhelming as to be devastatingly debilitating, they should be seen as having mental health problems and offered medical support.
However, many who are depressed and anxious will not meet those criteria and may be better construed as suffering an existential reaction to life stress, rather than a medical problem (Fielding, 2021; Keyes 2002). Of course, they still need support – but the optimal support might not be medical, and indeed medicalising normal reactions to life stress may do more harm than good (Thornton, 2022).
What can we offer, to support the young in dealing with the stresses of life? One popular option has been to try to help the young to “chill out”, through meditative practices such as “mindfulness” (Felver et al, 2016) – but meta-review of relevant research concludes that there is insufficient or only inconclusive evidence that this is effective (Farias & Wiholm, 2016). For some individuals, it is actively harmful (Lustyk et al, 2009).
Another approach is to help the young to directly think through the situations causing their stress and to find functional ways to rebuild hope in our strange new world (Thornton, 2021) – and there is evidence that such interventions can, indeed, foster emotional wellbeing (Marques et al, 2009).
An interesting suggestion is that classrooms could be redesigned to present more “therapeutic” environments (Knight, 2018) – an intuitively appealing idea. Another possibility is that emotional wellbeing can be fostered through “normal” activities.
Sport, music and art not only provide distraction from woe, but are popularly thought to be inherently beneficial to mental and emotional health. This article examines the possibilities of fostering wellbeing through music.
Music, arts and sports and their links to good mental health
- Music and mental health: A powerful way to destress? This Article.
- Art and mental health: Catharsis or distraction? Published November 21
- Sports and mental health: Is exercise better than mindfulness? Due November 30
Claims for music and wellbeing
In one form or another, music is present in every culture, in every society, at every level in society – and long present through human history, as is attested by the discovery of a bone flute that is at least 50,000-years-old.
Music plays all sorts of roles in our lives, from social bonding (think not only football crowds, church, national anthem but the bonding that comes from sharing a casual sing-song) to personal and collective emotional expression (think not only of the grandeur of the works of great classic composers, such as Chopin’s “marche funebre”, or Elgar’s many nationalistic contributions, nor only the popular songs that capture our joys and woes, but also of the particular music we individually choose in significant moments in our lives).
The common assumption that music can be healing is very old. It’s an idea that goes back thousands of years in our culture, to the Ancient Greeks including Aristotle, Plato and Pythagoras – who explicitly argued, more than 2,000 years ago, that music could be medicinal, providing benefits to both physical and emotional health (Greenberg & Renfrew, 2017). Similar ideas are found in even older Chinese writing. Today, music is used therapeutically in various forms to foster mental health and wellbeing (Greenberg & Rentfrow, 2017; de Witte et al, 2019), from hospitals to care homes.
But how far is the idea that music can foster emotional and physical wellbeing supported in research? And can we use music in schools to counter the stresses that are presently pressing down on our youth? If so, how can we optimise the benefits in schools?
Positive benefits of music
The human voice can be immensely emotionally expressive, and it seems probable that singing, and music in general developed from this (Justlin & Vastfjall, 2008). So it is no surprise that music can have powerful effects on our emotions, fostering a surgent joy, reducing us to tears, calm or even terrifying us.
There is considerable evidence supporting the claim that music can improve wellbeing. Mothers around the world sing to their infants, and this has been shown to soothe and reduce distress (Vlismas et al, 2013). Appropriately chosen music has been shown to reduce anxiety in adults suffering from dementia (Sung et al, 2012). Equally, the use of music in therapy has been shown to improve mental health in individuals suffering from anxiety, depression and even schizophrenia (Fancourt et al, 2016; Mössler et al, 2011; Erkkilä et al, 2011).
Music can improve mood and benefit social interaction (Edwards, 2006). These effects may be mediated by the physiological effects of music – for example, on heart rate (Bradt et al, 2013). Music can create the relaxation that reduces both physiological and emotional stress – and unlike other forms of intervention, music can have these effects without the need for words, and perhaps without the need for thoughts or conscious effort to those ends, a potential that can be very useful in many contexts.
Formal music therapy is a highly structured intervention led by a professional therapist. But music has also been shown to have benefits in informal, everyday settings (Daykin et al, 2018; Sung et al, 2012; Vlismas et al, 2013). So, can we use music more deliberately and explicitly to support the young through the stresses and dysphoria of present times?
Not all music has positive effects
A strongly as the research supports the therapeutic power of music, it also sounds notes of warning.
First, not all music fosters positive effects. For example, whereas much classical music has been shown to have beneficial effects on wellbeing, exposure to some “grunge” rock music increases stress, tension, and feelings of hostility (McCraty et al 1998).
Listening to lyrics in certain types of popular music is associated with increased misogyny, and even with gang violence (Pinkley & Robinson-Edwards, 2018). And we scarcely need research to tell us that certain kinds of patriotic music can even incite us to fight and die for a leader – a feature exploited, for instance by the Nazis, and most armies.
Second, the effects of music are not as universal as has been supposed. For example, perhaps unsurprisingly, classical music has more powerful beneficial effects on adults than teenagers. Much more surprising is the recent evidence that the tendency for music in a major key to be perceived as happy and music in a minor key as sad is not universal – this bias is not observed in some cultures (Smit et al, 2022).
It is seeming increasingly likely that the power of particular forms of music to soothe or rile is not mediated by an “automatic” – perhaps autonomic – process, but is far more a learned response, a cultural construct that may well be learned in infancy and childhood through the songs we sing to and with children. This may have important implications for the use of music to foster wellbeing in schools where there is marked cultural diversity.
Practical suggestions from the research
Active engagement: Engaging in musical activity can have a potent impact on mood and emotional wellbeing. Not every pupil can play an instrument, but luckily quite simple musical activities can provide benefits for wellbeing, for example drumming (Fancourt et al, 2016) or singing (Fancourt & Perkins, 2018).
Passive listening: Listening as part of a formal music class may play an important role in “grounding” a day, though there is little research on how long such benefits might persist after the session. An alternative is to provide subtle background music. The power of background music should not be underestimated. It can have subliminal effects, influencing us even though we don’t consciously notice it.
Care in choice of activity/music: As the research cited above notes, the specific music to which the young are exposed will determine whether the effects are likely to be beneficial to mental wellbeing – or not. As yet, there is no available “recipe” for background music to maximise wellbeing through a school community. The research quoted suggests certain genres to avoid or to favour, but also suggests that there may be cultural sensitivities that need to be taken into account.
Studies of music therapy suggest that it works best when the patient is involved in the choice of music (Greenberg & Rentfrow, 2017; de Witte et al, 2019). Extrapolating this to schools would involve group decisions, which may be hard, particularly where there is considerable diversity in a school – but the debate itself might be interesting!
- Dr Stephanie Thornton is a chartered psychologist, author and lecturer in psychology and child development. She is the co-author of Understanding Developmental Psychology (Macmillan International/Red Globe, 2021). To read her previous articles for SecEd, visit http://bit.ly/seced-thornton
Further information & references
- Commission on Young Lives: Heads up: Rethinking mental health services for vulnerable young people, thematic report 4, July 2022: https://bit.ly/3BR4P6y
- Daykin et al: What works for wellbeing? A systematic review of wellbeing outcomes for music and singing in adults, Perspectives in Public Health (138,1), 2018.
- De Witte et al: Effects of music interventions on stress-related outcomes, Health Psychological Review (14), 2019.
- Farias & Wiholm: Has the science of mindfulness lost its mind? BJPsych Bulletin (40), 2016.
- Fielding: Languishing is the mood of 2021, how to identify it and how to cope, Mental Health News, 2021: https://bit.ly/2RBfgIv
- Felver et al: A systematic review of mindfulness-based interventions for youth in school settings, Mindfulness (7), 2016.
- Ford et al: Mental health of children and young people during pandemic, BMJ (10:372), 2021.
- Greenberg & Rentfrow: Music and big data: A new frontier, Current opinion in behavioral sciences (18), 2017.
- Keyes: The mental health continuum: From languishing to flourishing in life, Journal of Health and Social Research (43), 2002.
- Knight: A calming, therapeutic environment, Headteacher Update, 2018: https://bit.ly/3iWlOfz
- Lustyk et al: Mindfulness meditation research: Issues of participant screening, safety procedures, and researcher training, Advances in Mind Body Medicine (24), 2009.
- Marques, Lopez, & Pais-Ribeiro: Building hope for the future: A program to foster strengths in middle-school students, Journal of Happiness Studies (12), 2009.
- McCraty et al: The effects of different types of music on mood, tension and mental clarity, Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine (4), 1998.
- ONS: Mental health of children and young people in the pandemic, 2020: https://bit.ly/3RfdvJY
- Pinkley & Robinson-Edwards: Gangs, music and the mediatisation of crime: Expressions, violations and validations, Safer Communities Journal (17), 2018.
- Smit et al: Emotional responses in Papua new Guinea show negligible evidence for a universal effect of major versus minor music, Plos One, 2022.
- Thornton: Rebuilding hope: Helping students to overcome despair, SecEd, 2021: https://bit.ly/3xclhKO
- Thornton: How will the bad news cycle of recent years affect young people? British Journal of Child Health (3), 2022.