Matt Sayles/Invision/AP/REX/Shutterstock
Can’t stand the new Taylor Swift track? A quick jolt to the brain might change your mind.
Just a few minutes of magnetic stimulation to the front of the brain was all it took for researchers to increase or decrease people’s love of music. They even managed to influence how much of their hard-earned cash they’re willing to spend on it.
Robert Zatorre of McGill University, Canada and colleagues asked 17 people to listen to pieces of music – some chosen by the volunteers, and some chosen by the experimenters – and rate how much the music gave them pleasure. On two occasions, they used a technique called transcranial magnetic stimulation to stimulate part of the brain. In the third trial, participants received a sham treatment in which the brain was not stimulated. The participants were also offered the chance to buy songs with their own money.
Using