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Duo musicians exhibit a broad variety of bodily gestures, but it is unclear how soloists’ and accompanists’ movements differ and to what extent they attract observers’ visual attention. In Experiment 1, seven musical duos’ body movements were tracked while they performed two pieces in two different conditions. In a congruent condition, soloist and accompanist behaved according to their expected musical roles; in an incongruent condition, the soloist behaved as accompanist and vice versa. Results revealed that behaving as soloist, regardless of the condition, led to more, smoother, and faster head and shoulder movements over a larger area than behaving as accompanist. Moreover, accompanists in the incongruent condition moved more than soloists in the congruent condition. In Experiment 2, observers watched videos of the duo performances with and without audio, while eye movements were tracked. Observers looked longer at musicians behaving as soloists compared to musicians behaving as accompanists, independent of their respective musical role. This suggests that visual attention was allocated to the most salient visuo-kinematic cues (i.e., expressive bodily gestures) rather than the most salient musical cues (i.e., the solo part). Findings are discussed regarding auditory-motor couplings and theories of motor control as well as auditory-visual integration and attention.

EDM event attendees are a high-risk population for substance use and associated adverse effects. The aim of this study was to examine substance use at EDM events, focusing on associations between attendance motives and substance use. Sociodemographic characteristics, event specifics, past-year use, and attendance motives were assessed through an online survey. Participants were 1345 Belgian EDM event attendees (69.44% male, Mage = 22.63, SDage = 4.03). Ecstasy/MDMA/Molly (52.28%), other synthetic hallucinogens (53.68%), ketamine (42.13%), amphetamines (40.45%), and alkyl nitrites (poppers) (32.76%) were most frequently used at festivals/outdoor parties/raves. In nightclubs, cocaine (32.29%) was shown to be prevalent as well, while other synthetic hallucinogens (15.79%) were less often consumed. At events with a more private character, cannabis (68.88%) and magic mushrooms (66.44%) were most frequently used. Aside from alcohol (47.76%), substance use in pubs/bars was negligible. Overall enjoyment was demonstrated to be the key attendance motive, which was succeeded by those relating to music and socialization. A wide range of motives proved to be more important to users (e.g., dance, exploration, escapism, excitement, alcohol, drugs) than non-users, while some were associated with the use of particular substances. The prevalence of substance use was shown to be dependent on the specifics of the setting. Moreover, the idea of a three-dimensional classification of the most principal motives for music event attendance was supported. Finally, correlations were estimated between attendance motives and substance use as well as specific substances. Results could enable more tailored approaches in prevention and harm reduction efforts as well as event management strategies.

Running with musical accompaniment is becoming increasingly popular and several pieces of software have been developed that match the music tempo to the exerciser’s running cadence, that is, foot strikes per minute. Synchronizing music with running cadence has been shown to affect several aspects of performance output and perception. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of synchronous music on runners’ foot impact loading. This represents the ground reaction force on the runner’s lower leg when the foot impacts the ground and is an important parameter for the prevention of tibial fracture injuries. Twenty-eight participants ran five times for three minutes and 30 seconds with a short break between each run. During the first 30 seconds of each running sequence, participants ran at a self-paced tempo without musical accompaniment, and running speed and cadence were measured. Subsequently, they were requested to keep their reference speed constant for the following three minutes, with the help of three monitoring screens placed along the track. During this part of the experiment, the music was either absent ( No Music), matched to the runner’s cadence ( Tempo-entrained Sync), phase-locked with foot strikes ( Phase-locked Sync), or played at a tempo 30% slower ( Minus 30%) or faster ( Plus 30%) than the initially measured running cadence. No significant differences between synchronous and asynchronous music were retrieved for impact loading. However, a non-negligible average increase of impact level could be observed for running sessions with music compared to running in silence. These findings might be especially relevant for treatment purposes, such as exercise prescription and gait retraining, and should be taken into account when designing musical (re-)training programmes.

Sensorimotor integration tasks, such as body movements in time with music, can foster the experience of flow – a pleasurable state of full engagement and concentration occurring during a seemingly effortless and automatic activity. As it can be argued that both music and flow are embodied phenomena, perception-action coupling might be the core of the intimate relationship between flow and music. The current study examines the relationship between the subjective experience of flow and sensorimotor synchronization accuracy/stability in a finger-tapping task with music. In a between-subjects design, participants tapped in time with the beat of music clips with either low, medium, or high rhythmic complexity. After the tapping task, they rated their flow state on the Flow Short Scale with the two subscales fluency of performance and absorption by activity. Tapping accuracy and stability were assessed by the circular variance and the SD of inter-tap-intervals (ITIs), respectively. Both tapping accuracy and stability were significantly correlated with fluency of performance for music clips with medium and high rhythmic complexity, but not for music clips with low rhythmic complexity. No significant correlations were found between tapping accuracy/stability and absorption by activity. The findings add to evidence that perception-action coupling plays a key role in explaining the relationship between flow experience and musical activities. They also suggest that absorption by activity is not as relevant to the experience of flow during musical activities as one might initially assume.

Taking regular walks when living with Parkinson’s disease (PD) has beneficial effects on movement and quality of life. Yet, patients usually show reduced physical activity compared to healthy older adults. Using auditory stimulation such as music can facilitate walking but patients vary significantly in their response. An individualized approach adapting musical tempo to patients’ gait cadence, and capitalizing on these individual differences, is likely to provide a rewarding experience, increasing motivation for walk-in PD. We aim to evaluate the observance, safety, tolerance, usability, and enjoyment of a new smartphone application. It was coupled with wearable sensors (BeatWalk) and delivered individualized musical stimulation for gait auto-rehabilitation at home. Forty-five patients with PD underwent a 1-month, outdoor, uncontrolled gait rehabilitation program, using the BeatWalk application (30 min/day, 5 days/week). The music tempo was being aligned in real-time to patients’ gait cadence in a way that could foster an increase up to +10% of their spontaneous cadence. Open-label evaluation was based on BeatWalk use measures, questionnaires, and a six-minute walk test. Patients used the application 78.8% (±28.2) of the prescribed duration and enjoyed it throughout the program. The application was considered “easy to use” by 75% of the patients. Pain, fatigue, and falls did not increase. Fear of falling decreased and quality of life improved. After the program, patients improved their gait parameters in the six-minute walk test without musical stimulation. BeatWalk is an easy to use, safe, and enjoyable musical application for individualized gait rehabilitation in PD. It increases “walk for exercise” duration thanks to high observance. This research was supported by a European grant: BeatHealth: Health and Wellness on the Beat for VC, DD, CL, AGi, VD, RV, EH, ED, ML, BB, and SB (EU FP7-ICT contract #610633).

Background: Walking regularly in Parkinson’s disease has beneficial effects on movement and quality of life. Yet, patients usually show reduced physical activity compared to healthy older adults. Using auditory stimulation, such as music, can facilitate walking but patients vary significantly in their response to the stimulus. An individualized approach adapting musical tempo to patients’ gait cadence, and capitalizing on these individual differences, is likely to provide a rewarding experience, with beneficial effects on gait in Parkinson’s disease. We aim to evaluate the observance, safety, tolerance, usability and enjoyment of a new smartphone application coupled with wearable sensors (BeatPark) delivering individualized musical stimulation for gait auto-rehabilitation at home. Methods: Forty-five patients with Parkinson’s disease underwent a one month, outdoor, gait rehabilitation program, using the BeatPark application (30 min/day, 5 days/week). The music tempo was aligned in real time to patients’ gait cadence while fostering an increase of cadence up to +20% of the patient’s preferred cadence. Evaluation was based on BeatPark use measures, questionnaires and a six-minute walk test before and after the rehabilitation program. Findings: Patients used the application 78.8 % (±28.2) of the prescribed duration and mostly enjoyed it, across the whole program. 75 % of them rated the application as easy to use. While using BeatPark, patients increased their ‘walk for exercise’ duration and frequency, reduced their fear of falling, and improved their quality of life. After the program, they improved their gait parameters in the six-minute walk test. Interpretation BeatPark is an easy to use and enjoyable musical application for individualized gait rehabilitation in Parkinson’s disease increasing ‘walk for exercise’ duration, confidence in gait and quality of life. Trial Registration: NCT02647242 Funding: This research was supported by a European grant: BeatHealth: Health and Wellness on the Beat (EU FP7-ICT contract #610633). Declaration of Interests: None to declare. Ethics Approval Statement: The study was approved by the National Ethics Committee (CPP Sud Mediterannee III, Nimes, France, ID-RCB: 2015-A00531-48). All participants gave written informed consent before participating.

Over the past decade, embodied music cognition has become an influential paradigm in music research. The paradigm holds that music cognition is strongly determined by corporeally mediated interactions with music. They determine the way in which music can be conceived in terms of goals, directions, targets, values, and reward. The chapter gives an overview of the ontological and epistemological foundations, and it introduces the core concepts that define the character of the paradigm. This is followed by an overview of some analytical and empirical studies, which illustrate contributions of the embodied music cognition approach to major topics in musical expression, timing, and prediction processing. The chapter gives a viewpoint on a music research paradigm that is in full development, both in view of the in-depth refinement of its foundations, as well as the broadening of its scope and applications.

In dance/movement therapy (DMT), it is a shared belief that humans can use dance movement to express themselves in ways they cannot do so with words. In research, the idea that emotions can be communicated through dance has been explored in more detail, especially in the area of music psychology. It is believed that expressive body movement encoded through dance can be distinguished from propositional movement patterns in that the movement patterns are meant to be stylized and focused expressions of the more subtle, naturalistic movement patterns associated with direct, spontaneous expressions of emotion. From the body of research people are able to express emotional content through dance, exhibiting distinct motion characteristics linked with specific emotion categories. People can recognize this content by observing dance movement, either presented fully or displayed in a more concentrated manner such as in point-light displays. However, many issues still should be taken into consideration when drawing conclusions from the existing body of research.

Sonification is a family of representational techniques under the umbrella of the more general term ‘auditory display’ for revealing information in data and communicating it in a non-speech aural form – sonification makes the inaudible audible. Sonification is not bound to any particular types of data and has been applied across a diverse range of domains. In all cases the purpose of sonification is to let people gain information about the phenomenon under investigation by listening to the data. Fundamentally, sonification is concerned with causation: the sounds we hear are caused by changes in data values sampled from some underlying phenomenon or domain of enquiry.

The aim of this study was to examine the effect of two basic emotions, happiness and sadness, on dance movement. A total of 32 adult participants were induced to feel emotional states of either happiness or sadness and then danced intuitively to an emotionally ‘neutral’ piece of music, composed specifically for the experiment. Based on an Effort-Shape analysis of body movement, full body movement was captured and seven different movement cues were examined, in order to explore whether differences in corporeal articulations between the happy and sad condition existed. Results revealed that in the happy condition, participants moved faster, with more acceleration, and made more expanded and more impulsive movements than in the sad condition. Results are discussed with respect to possible consequences for future research on human movement.

The present study aims to gain better insight into the connection between music and dance by examining the dynamic effects of the bass drum on a dancing audience in a club-like environment. One hundred adult participants moved freely in groups of five to a musical sequence that comprised six songs. Each song consisted of one section that was repeated three times, each time with a different sound pressure level of the bass drum. Hip and head movements were recorded using motion capture and motion sensing. The study demonstrates that people modify their bodily behavior according to the dynamic level of the bass drum when moving to contemporary dance music in a social context. Participants moved more actively and displayed a higher degree of tempo entrainment as the sound pressure level of the bass drum increased. These results indicate that the prominence of the bass drum in contemporary dance music serves not merely as a stylistic element; indeed, it has a strong influence on dancing itself.

The use of music and specifically tempo-matched music has been shown to affect running performance. But can we maximize the synchronization of movements to music and does maximum synchronization influence kinematics and motivation? In this study, we explore the effect of different types of music-to-movement alignment strategies on phase coherence, cadence and motivation. These strategies were compared to a control condition where the music tempo was deliberately not aligned to the running cadence. Results show that without relative phase alignment, a negative mean asynchrony (NMA) of footfall timings with respect to the beats is obtained. This means that footfalls occurred slightly before the beat and that beats were anticipated. Convergence towards this NMA or preferred relative phase angle was facilitated when the first music beat of a new song started close to the step, which means that entrainment occurred. The results also show that using tempo and phase alignment, the relative phase can be manipulated or forced in a certain angle with a high degree of accuracy. Ensuring negative angles larger than NMA (step before beat) results in increased motivation and decreasing cadence. Running in NMA or preferred relative phase angles results in a null effect on cadence. Ensuring a positive phase angle with respect to NMA results in higher motivation and higher cadence. None of the manipulations resulted in change in perceived exhaustion or a change in velocity. Results also indicate that gender plays an important role when using forced phase algorithms: effects were more pronounced for the female population than for the male population. The implementation of the proposed alignment strategies and control of beat timing while running opens possibilities optimizing the individual running cadence and motivation.

Background Since accumulating evidence suggests that step rate is strongly associated with running-related injuries, it is important for runners to exercise at an appropriate running cadence. As music tempo has been shown to be capable of impacting exercise performance of repetitive endurance activities, it might also serve as a means to (re)shape running cadence. The aim of this study was to validate the impact of music tempo on running cadence. Methods Sixteen recreational runners ran four laps of 200 m (i.e. 800 m in total); this task was repeated 11 times with a short break in between each four-lap sequence. During the first lap of a sequence, participants ran at a self-paced tempo without musical accompaniment. Running cadence of the first lap was registered, and during the second lap, music with a tempo matching the assessed cadence was played. In the final two laps, the music tempo was either increased/decreased by 3.00, 2.50, 2.00, 1.50, or 1.00 % or was kept stable. This range was chosen since the aim of this study was to test spontaneous entrainment (an average person can distinguish tempo variations of about 4 %). Each participant performed all conditions. Results Imperceptible shifts in musical tempi in proportion to the runner’s self-paced running tempo significantly influenced running cadence (p

The expressive features of music can influence the velocity of walking. So far, studies used instructed (and intended) synchronization. But is this velocity effect still present with non-instructed (spontaneous) synchronization? To figure that out, participants were instructed to walk in their own comfort tempo on an indoor track, first in silence and then with tempo-matched music. We compared velocities of silence and music conditions. The results show that some music has an activating influence, increasing velocity and motivation, while other music has a relaxing influence, decreasing velocity and motivation. The influence of musical expression on the velocity of self-paced walking can be predicted with a regression model using only three sonic features explaining 56% of the variance. Phase-coherence between footfall and beat did not contribute to the velocity effect, due to its implied fixed pacing. The findings suggest that the velocity effect depends on vigor entrainment that influences both stride length and pacing. Our findings are relevant for preventing injuries, for gait improvement in walking rehabilitation, and for improving performance in sports activities.

Recent research revealed that emotional content can be successfully decoded from human dance movement. Most previous studies made use of videos of actors or dancers portraying emotions through choreography. The current study applies emotion induction techniques and free movement in order to examine the recognition of emotional content from dance. Observers (N = 30) watched a set of silent videos showing depersonalized avatars of dancers moving to an emotionally neutral musical stimulus after emotions of either sadness or happiness had been induced. Each of the video clips consisted of two dance performances which were presented side-by-side and were played simultaneously; one of a dancer in the happy condition and one of the same individual in the sad condition. After every film clip, the observers were asked to make forced-choices concerning the emotional state of the dancer. Results revealed that observers were able to identify the emotional state of the dancers with a high degree of accuracy. Moreover, emotions were more often recognized for female dancers than for their male counterparts. In addition, the results of eye tracking measurements unveiled that observers primarily focus on movements of the chest when decoding emotional information from dance movement. The findings of our study show that not merely portrayed emotions, but also induced emotions can be successfully recognized from free dance movement.

In running competitions portable music players and headphones are often banned. In some cases, runners have been disqualified after using such devices during competition. In this paper, it is discussed whether, aside from possible safety reasons, such competition regulations make sense and whether music can have an ergogenic effect on performance. Although a definitive conclusion on the regulation matter is not of our concern here, we review evidence of the fact that music is capable of enhancing performance in running and a range of different sports, predominantly for short duration exercise with low-to-medium intensity. The use of music players can be beneficial for training. However, it is reasonable to avoid these devices and headphones in case of championships for professional athletes.