Sad music creates a contradictory mix of emotions that are pleasant to experience.
According to a new study by Kawakami et al. (2013), sad music is enjoyable because it creates an interesting mix of emotions; some negative, some positive. In their study, they found that:
They reached this conclusion by asking…
The key to enjoying sad music is that although we perceive the negative emotions, our felt emotions aren’t as strong as these perception. Perhaps this is because:
Although we can’t currently explain the cathartic effect of sad music—or indeed sad art in general—perhaps:
This is just one of the psychological reasons why music is important.
You can also try the experiment for yourself. Here is one of the pieces they used in the research, it’s Glinka’s “La Séparation” in F minor. How does it make you feel?
About the author
Psychologist, Jeremy Dean, PhD is the founder and author of PsyBlog. He holds a doctorate in psychology from University College London and two other advanced degrees in psychology.
He has been writing about scientific research on PsyBlog since 2004. He is also the author of the book “Making Habits, Breaking Habits” (Da Capo, 2003) and several ebooks.
Kayode Emmanuel Ojo is the Co-Founder and Managing Director at SHEFFA Limited. He is presently studying Computer Science at the National Open University, Victoria Island, Lagos.