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The researchers found that when study subjects took
naltrexone, they reported their favorite songs were no
longer pleasurable (there was no change with the placebo).
However, when they listened to music they didn’t have
strong feelings about, the drug didn’t make a significant
difference.
The participants said their favorite music “still sounded
pretty, but they weren’t moved by it” under the influence
of the opioid-blocker, says McGill neuroscientist Daniel
Levitin, who authored the study along with postdoctoral
researcher Mona Lisa Chanda and Adiel Mallik, a Ph.D.
student. “Normally it made them feel good, but [naltrex-
one] left them not feeling anything.”
Previous work by Valorie Salimpoor, from Canada’s Rot-
man Research Institute, has shown that the neurotransmit-
ter dopamine is involved in the “reward” associated with
music, says Josep Marco-Pallarés, a neuroscientist at the
University of Barcelona. However, the Scientific Reports
paper is the first to his knowledge to conclusively show
opioids also play a role in the sensation, he says.
The results are not unexpected, Marco-Pallarés says, as
music has always been considered highly pleasurable, and
new research shows it can also dull pain. Levitin notes that
listening to pleasant music during and prior to surgery can
reduce a patient’s discomfort.
Ethnomusicologist Alexandre Tannous, who uses a mixture
of sound and meditation to help people with their emotion-
al struggles, says it’s interesting to know what receptors
are involved, but wishes more researchers would examine
the ancient, sometimes esoteric origins of the use of music
for healing. This power has been noted by thinkers such
as Plato, Socrates and Pythagoras. “The way sound heals
is incredibly complex, [and] somehow acts to re-calibrate
the emotional state…to bring back alive once again the full
emotional capacity of the person.”
People consistently rank music among the top 10 things
that bring the most pleasure, usually ranking it above mon-
ey, food or visual art, says Vanderbilt University professor
David Zald. “In that sense, it can be viewed as a ‘healthy
addiction.’” So “it may not be surprising,” he adds, “that
the same neurochemicals and receptor that play a key role
in addiction play a role in musical pleasure.”
Music and sex stimulate the same part of the brain