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Simulated Methods and Results

Dissertation - Chapter Three

By Justin Ames GamachePublished 4 years ago 23 min read
1

Introduction (Chapter three)

The topic of research is one I have chosen to work closely with over the past 12 years of my life and pertains to sound and the human body. The research goes as Music and sound have influenced throughout the history of human life on this planet. Today music and sound are used as a medicine to improve the overall quality of life, to discover what music does to the human stress response, and how it affects the human brain. Patients of music find it to be a reliever of stress, pain, anxiety issues and can help get through cancer treatments. Research finds that students of music have increased grades, high GPAs, creativity, and higher intellectual reasoning about school and life.

Purpose of the Proposed Study

The purpose of this research is to examine the effects of music and silence. The purpose of this study will be using a group which will experiment with music, sound, and silence. This study will help develop research in the medical field, but will also build a music program for the local school. Finally, this proposal will be the standing foundation for music therapy and music education that will help fill the gaps in understanding the effects of sound on the human body.

The sound effects the human body delivers developing research that shows how music is the center of emotion, feelings, art, creativity. Music is an evolutionary breakthrough, and its power is unbelievable. That is when there becomes an understanding that sound frequencies and rhythm can be used as a treatment to help improve our physical conditions that experienced in the human body then we will genuinely grasp its natural powers.

Research Question and Hypothesis

What are the Effects of Sound on the Human Body?

I am studying how sound effects the human body because I want to find out people react to sound, and how sound can be used to treat physical and mental conditions that affect the human body.

First, Sound is fast regaining its place as the pre-eminent healing modality. Having been first used by the ancients, sound therapy has undergone a period of re-discovery and is now poised to reveal the intricacies of healing both at the cellular and psychological levels. Music is suggested to be one of the most beneficial ways to help lower the impact of stress on the human body Brönnimann, R., Ehlert, U., Finkle, L., Marca, R., Nater, U., & Thoma, M., (2013). While these researchers carefully examined the effects of music on the human body, they found an enormous gap of knowledge when it comes to an understanding of the full benefits of music to the human body. Researchers examined these effects across endocrine, autonomic, cognitive, and the emotional domains that impact on the human stress response in the body (para. 1).

Additionally, while there is a growing number of a musical therapist in this world, doctors have agreed that music used as medicine that involves a functional guitar, piano, and a voice can help patients recover faster from the physical and mental impairments that tie the human body down (para. 4). There are natural reasons for anyone to embark on the journey of musical therapy, and from personal experiences, I have used musical therapy to help the physical impairments of arthritis that I live with today.

Finally, the most critical reason sound is fast regaining its place as the pre-eminent healing modality. Having been first used by the ancients, sound therapy has undergone a period of re-discovery and is now poised to reveal the intricacies of healing both at the cellular and psychological levels. Amy Novotney (2014) said that "music has been recognized as an effective form of therapy to provide an outlet for emotions" (para. 5). Music is the center of emotion, feelings, art, creativity, and these are the things that I have personal experience on a continuous cycle of my life. So, if music can be medicine to treat the mental impairments of depression, then why are prescriptions still being written for treatments? I say music is an evolutionary breakthrough, and its power is unbelievable.

Research Design

As a researcher, investigating my research question will be by selecting a case that provides evidence on the effects of sound on the body and then observes and measures aspects which seem too distinct from the case. Observations and measurements vary in how structured they are. In the case study, there will be observations made on sound effects to the human body and will be taken into record while the measurements in the study will be much less structured. The study will build from a survey of questions which would be used to ask how sound made the person feel when they participated in my experiment of sound, music, and silence. Studies that based on experiments are much more structured. This researcher will enhance the comparability of observations but also reduce the chances of detecting aspects not covered by a predefined structure.

Target population

The students whom this study will affect are middle and high school students. Again, our senior citizens in this study will be our wise and noble teachers, and our younger generations need to take an example in learning from their elders.

My study will have four different groups; each group will have a different activity that they will accomplish. Group one will listen to relaxing classical music; group two will listen to the sound of rain and ripple water; group three will improvise and create their music, and group four will sit in silence. After each team finishes, they will answer a few questions anonymously, and complete a task to see how music and sound affected their thinking patterns and choices to fill out the work. The focus of the content is to help encourage more students to sign up for a music class at the local school, as well as provide an example that music is an important key factor in school and that students can benefit from longer class times in music.

Sampling Methods (power)

Music is suggested to be one of the most beneficial ways to help lower the impact of stress on the human body Brönnimann, R., Ehlert, U., Finkle, L., Marca, R., Nater, U., & Thoma, M., (2013). While these researchers carefully examined the effects of music on the human body, they found an enormous gap of knowledge when it comes to an understanding of the full benefits of music to the human body. Researchers examined these effects across endocrine, autonomic, cognitive, and the emotional domains that impact on the human stress response in the body (para. 1).

These results found that listening to music influences the pressure that is put on the stress system and can help the autonomic nervous system (para. 3). The researchers hypothesized that listening to relaxing music before a stress test, and then comparing it to rippling water and having rest without acoustic stimulation. Salivary cortisol, heart rate, respiratory sinus arrhythmia, had a minor stress response across all measured parameters in the body (para. 3).

Related Procedures

According to Berkeley Wellness (2014) that an idea describes music to have healing powers like medicine. Its powers have occurred in many cultures and travel back to ancient times, which also talks about Apollo the God of music and healing (para. 1). Research confirms that music has psychological and physiological effects which found to be good for the mind, body, and soul (para. 2). However, can also be described by particular medical imaging that showed changes in the brain of a person listening to Beethoven or Elvis, this has a very complex stimulus power to affect the human body (para. 2). With that in mind, music therapy is one of the significant discussions which allows the use of music to address physical, psychological, cognitive, or social problems in the human brain and body (para. 3) — this research accepted as the role in modern medicine of today's world for children and adults. Musical therapy is an adjunct treatment for everything such as strokes and various types of chronic pain to memory issues with dementia and neurological disorders (para. 4).

Instrumentation

Based on my research question, the effects of music on the human body, I have chosen to survey my participants before and after the study. There will be six anonymous pre-survey questions and two post survey questions. The pre-survey questions will get a sense of understanding how music and sound are used in their daily activities, if they feel extreme enjoyment while listening to music, how music affects their mood, and to personally describe the feeling or emotions that the participants experience when they listen to music. The last two questions of the survey will answer after the study; these issues will allow the participant to check how the study helped them and what did they learn.

The pre-and-post survey/questionnaire will be used to generate a combination of qualitative and quantitative data for analysis. This survey/questionnaire will allow for the research to obtain information about participants' way of thinking, feelings, and reasonable beliefs. The research and study will allow the researcher freedom and power to tailor the questions so that they can address the research questions for this particular study. The data used will perform quantitative analyses which will consist of descriptive statistics and correlations obtained from the survey results. The qualitative data that will be analyzed will specifically be looking for possible trends across the participants’ answers.

There will be two themes that I would expect from this study. The first idea that I would expect to occur the most would be that the participants had spontaneously used music to regulate their mood. The second theme that I would expect to see least occur would be that music allowed the participants to be in contact with their feelings or helped them feel calm and relaxed. There would hopefully be a few other themes that I would be able to arise from the study. These items could allow the participant a chance to enjoy the study and learn a lot about the benefits of music and sound, as well as the member could identify a range between one and thirteen of the emotions during the study in the last question in the Post Survey.

Most importantly that there was positive reinforcement of feelings that were the most frequently experienced in this study, those positive emotions were happy, inspired, vibrant, proud, determined, and capable. The participant in this study discovered that music and sound have significant benefits to the overall health of the human body.

Data Collection

My research site will take place in a subtle town located in the rural area of Southern Vermont, and will hold at the local municipal center. The people that will be involved in the study will our most respected senior citizens, ages 55 to 96, and will take place in study groups which will provide the local school information how music or sound impacts their bodies. The study also shows the local music program the importance of music, and to encourage more students to sign up for band and chorus. I will also be directly involved in this research because I want to learn and understand from a senior citizen’s perspective how music and sound impact their bodies. The data collected from this study will be significantly related to the student population in the music program (and to increase music class from forty-five minutes to two hours and fifteen minutes) at the local middle and high school. However, will also give a definite and clear understanding of how music and sound impact our human bodies to proceed with daily activities in life and school. Our most respected senior citizens will be our wise and noble teachers in this area because they have years' worth of rich culture and history.

Baseline Data

It will take some time putting together a baseline data package which will show how music and sound affect the human body. How music lowers stress in the body, and how it can help students to increase their learning capacities. Taking data from our most heart filled senior citizens from the anonymous questionnaire and the task given will provide the younger generations an idea of how they can use music in their life. (I will also be observing this study so that I too can learn from each example, and use this research to improve the way I teach music. The data collected will be used to discover senior citizens’ trends in the taste of music. So, it would be the wise and noble choice to ask both types of groups (seniors citizens, and middle/high school students) what kind of music they enjoy the most in the questionnaire, but also include a compare and contrast in the taste of music between senior citizens and the younger generations. When did their trends in the taste of music change for them?

In this area, the proof relies on personal experience, that music and sound have different effects from person to person. The idea is to provide the upside to music and sound, where it can be positively used to increase the music classroom populations and allow for longer duration in music class. Clearly, music and sound can be used to lower stress, help increases creativity, and it can also be used in general education to help students improve their grades and GPA's. An example from my private music students describes how music lowers their stress before a final exam and helps anxiety towards dealing with common factors in my student's life in and out of school.

Helping all Ages to Connect to Life and the World

This study will be by far one of the most significant solutions that will allow for some freedom after all music and sound have much liberty which is intended to bring creativity, innovation, and ability to follow their intuition. Studies are showing that learning to play an instrument can bring significant improvements in anyone who has the heart and goals to be a part of music and sound (2014). The core of my study and action research, because the studies show that learning to play an instrument can bring significant improvements to the human brain and will help anyone at any age connect to the fast-growing world.

Operationalization of Variables

Most of the society is now aware that noise can damage hearing. However, short of a threat that disaster would overtake the human race if nothings done about noise, it is unlikely that many people today would become strongly motivated to do something about the problem. The evidence about the ill effects of noise does not allow for complacency or neglect. There are two types of hearing loss: conductive and sensorineural. In conductive deafness sound-pressure waves never reach the cochlea, most often as a consequence of a ruptured eardrum or a defect in the ossicles of the middle ear. The three bones form a system of levers linked together, hammer pushing anvil, anvil-pushing stirrup. The bones amplify the force of sound vibrations. Taken together, the bones double, often treble the force of the vibrations reaching the eardrum. Mitigation of potentially harmful amplification occurs via muscles of the middle ear. These muscles act as a safety device protects the ear against excessive vibrations from thunderous noises, very much like an automatic damper or volume control.

Data Analysis and Procedures

Based on my research question, what are the effects of music on the human body, a survey will be given to the participants before and after the study. There will be six anonymous pre-survey questions and two post survey questions. The pre-survey questions will get a sense of understanding how music and sound are used in their daily activities, if they feel extreme enjoyment while listening to music, how music affects their mood, and to personally describe the feeling or emotions that the participants experience when they listen to music. The issues of will allow the participant to check how the study helped them and what did they learn.

The pre-and-post survey/questionnaire will be used to generate a combination of qualitative and quantitative data for analysis. This survey/questionnaire will allow for the research to obtain information about participants' way of thinking, feelings, and reasonable beliefs. The research and study will allow the researcher freedom and power to tailor the questions so that they can address the research questions for this particular study. The data used will perform quantitative analyses which will consist of descriptive statistics and correlations obtained from the survey results. The qualitative data that will be analyzed will specifically be looking for possible trends across the participants’ answers.

There will be two themes that would be expected from this study. The first theme will allow the participants to explain if they have ever used music spontaneously to regulate their mood. The second theme would allow the participants to be in contact with their feelings and examine if the music had helped them feel relaxed. These items could allow the participants a chance to enjoy the study and learn a lot from the benefits of music and sound, as well as if members could identify a range between one and thirteen of the emotions during the study in the last question of the Post Survey. Most importantly music and sound will have positive reinforcement of feelings that were the most frequently experienced in this study. Those positive emotions were happy, inspired, vibrant, proud, determined, and capable. The participant in this study discovered that music and sound have significant benefits to the overall health of the human body.

Limitations of the Research Design

The limitations to the research design that I am unable to control are the limits of perception to the human ear which is mostly due to the frequency of the ear which is 3.6 Hz and is because changes occur in pitch larger than 3.6 Hz that can be perceived in a clinical setting. However, even smaller pitch differences can be perceived by other means. For example, the interference of two pitches can often be heard as a repetitive variation in the volume of the tone. This amplitude modulation occurs with a frequency equal to the difference in frequencies of the two tones and is known as beating.

A more rigorous exploration of the lower limits of audibility determines that the minimum threshold at which a sound can be heard is frequency dependent. By measuring this minimum intensity for testing tones of various frequencies, a frequency dependent absolute threshold of hearing (ATH) curve may be derived. Typically, the ear shows a peak of sensitivity (i.e., its lowest ATH) between 1–5 kHz, though the threshold changes with age, with older ears showing decreased sensitivity above 2 kHz.

Sound localization is the process of determining the location of a sound source. The brain utilizes subtle differences in loudness, tone, and timing between the two ears to allow us to localize sound sources. Localization can be described regarding three-dimensional position: the azimuth or horizontal angle, the zenith or vertical angle, and the distance (for static sounds) or velocity (for moving sounds). Humans, as most four-legged animals, are adept at detecting the direction in the horizontal, but less so in the vertical due to the ears being placed symmetrically.

Internal Validity

The internal validity of this study determines that four ways sound effects the human body; the first way is physiological, where sounds are hugely affecting your secretions all the time, but also your breathing, heart rate, and your brainwaves. The second way sound affects the human body is through the use of music which is the most potent form of sound that we know today, and it affects our emotion. The third way sounds affect the human body is cognitive; no one can understand two people talking at once, you have to choose to listen to only one person. The final or fourth way sounds affect the human body is through behavior; say for example many things are happening at once and our behavior reacts to these happenings, for example, driving down the road at 28 mph and all of a sudden you hear a jackhammer, and horns blowing. Your behavior will react with caution because you do not know what is going to happen so you must be careful.

External Validity

Here an experimental study on the effects of train noise and vibrations on the human heart rate during sleep. Transportation of goods on railways is increasing, and the majority of the increased numbers of freight trains run during the night. Transportation noise has adverse effects on sleep structure, affects the heart rate (HR) during sleep and may be linked to cardiovascular disease. Freight trains also generate vibration and little is known regarding the impact of vibration on human sleep. The results show that the train exposure led to a significant change of heart rate with one minute of exposure onset of p=0.002 and is characterized by an initial and delayed increase to the heart rate. The vibrations were high and provoked an average increase of at least three beats per minutes per the train in only 79% of the participants. The Cardiac responses were in general higher with the vibrations that were higher than the low vibrations at p=0.006. There was no significant effect of sensitivity to the noise, although there was a tendency that showed men had exhibited an increase in their heart rate than women did. To conclude this experimental study, freight trains had provoked heart rate increase during sleep, and the vibration characteristics of the trains are essential. In the long term, this could affect the cardiovascular functioning of persons living close to railways, and the effects are different in each body.

Expected Findings

The conceptual framework of this study will provide the assumption and theories that sound and music have a positive side-effect to the human body. Sound and music can be used as medicinal purposes to help patients that have physical and mental conditions. The plan is to study the Mozart effect, the Yanni effect, the effects of sound as a natural sound from nature, and the use of sound or music as medicinal purposes to help individuals who have physical and mental issues. Music can be used as medicine to help treat the physical and mental impairments in the human body. The purpose of this research is to provide an example of the different effects music provides to the human body, and become the backbone for the development of music education.

Ethical issues in the Proposed Study

Acute noise events which do not cause permanent health impairments are considered as non-substantial. However, the effects of long-term noise exposure, which do not habituate but increase the long-term risk of physical damage, are assessed as health hazards. Environmental noise effects cannot be extrapolated from short-term laboratory findings, as has been shown in a study: "Stress reactions and health hazards induced by traffic noise exposure, comparison of methods between field and laboratory trials" (Ising, para. 6, 1983). Several hours of exposure to road noise under field conditions at level L m = 60 dB caused greater blood pressure reactions in self-estimated noise sensitive persons than in those who were noise insensitive. Short-term sound exposure in the laboratory with intermittent noise at L =100 dB showed opposite results. No correlation between blood pressure reactions under field conditions with hours of exposure and laboratory studies with a duration of several minutes could be established.

Summary of Chapter three

Music can be used as medicine to help treat the physical and mental impairments in life. Music can be utilized on the breaking discovery to develop solutions on the human stress response. The most significant discovery is that its effects on the brain are confident, and allows for the opportunity to increase its functions towards memory. The purpose of this research is to provide an example of the different effects sound has on the human body, and will become the design to develop a strong music educational program. The study on the consequences of music on the human body will allow students to experience first-hand the positive effects and learn about the adverse effects of sound and will fill the gaps to understanding how sound effects the human body.

Quantitative Chapter Four Introduction

In this chapter a survey was given to 13 young adults and elderly where each person would score between a 10 and 1, 10 being the most positive they felt from the effects of sound to 1 the least positive they felt from the effects of sound. It had shown that the elderly had a least favorable time when they were involved with sound to a young person who had the most favorable time when they were involved with sound. The test concludes that elderly do enjoy silence more than someone of a young age.

Reiteration of Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this research is to examine the effects of music and silence. Music and sound will be studied by using a study group which will experiment with music, sound, and silence. This study will help develop research in the medical field, but will also build a music program for the local school. Finally, this proposal will be the standing foundation for music therapy and music education that will help fill the gaps in understanding the effects of sound on the human body.

Summary of the Results per Research Question

The independent sample t-test per research question shows that for elderly N = 13, mean = 4.84615, lower 2.6556, and upper 7.0368. There was a significance of .000 for both young and old, while young t =14.592, df = 12, Mean dif = 7.23077, lower = 6.1511, and upper = 8.3105.

Using Detailed Analysis

Research agrees that sound and music have a positive effect on the overall health of the human body, and there are many commonalities when it comes to music and sound on the human body. However, from the recent results of the t-test, there is evidence that the older you get, the more you enjoy having silence around as if you have become a great noble and wise teacher while being younger you enjoy having sounds and music playing consistently.

An indication of Rejection or Retention of Hypothesis

It is true that the older you get, the more you reject certain sounds while being younger you are acceptable to sounds and respond quickly. However, there was no rejection to sound through one group of people might enjoy having silence more than the other each group responds about the same to sound as if they were to respond to silence.

Chapter Four Summary

So, it seems that the benefits described in this review are widespread, and is in detail that describes the positive effects of sound and music. Music can be used as medicine to help treat the physical and mental impairments in life. Music can be utilized on the breaking discovery to develop solutions on the human stress response. The most significant discovery is that its effects on the brain are confident, and allows for the opportunity to increase its functions towards memory.

References

Brönnimann, R., Ehlert, U., Finkle, L., Marca, R., Nater, U., & Thoma, V., (2013). The effect of music on the human stress response. R. L. Newton (Ed). Published online 2013 Aug 5. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0070156.

Ising, H. (1983) Stress responses and health risks of traffic noise pollution. WaBoLu reports 2/1983, Dietrich Reimer. Berlin

Lucas, C. (2015). Boost memory and learning with music. Retrieved on January 31, 2017, from http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/music-arts/boost-memory-and-learning-with-music/

Novotney, A. (2013). Music as medicine. American Psychology Association. 44(10). Retrieved January 31, 2017, from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2013/11/music.aspx.

Wellness, B. (2014). Music as medicine. Retrieved from http://www.berkeleywellness.com/healthy-mind/mind-body/article/music-medicine.

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About the Creator

Justin Ames Gamache

“Be yourself — not your idea of what you think somebody else’s idea of yourself should be.” — Henry David Thoreau

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