Reflection No. 4: Why Our Brains Might Light Up Like a Christmas Tree on an fMRI?

The aspects of human behavior that plays the greatest role in causing our brains to light up like a Christmas tree through a brain imaging scan such as an fMRI are emotions and memories. Yes, the motivation to move through singing and dancing will cause areas of our brain associated with motor control to light up, but not without the motivating factors of emotion and memory.

When sitting in our cars singing along to a song, we are motivated to sing by how we feel about the song we are listening to. We could be singing either because it just makes us happy, or it stirs up pleasant memories that elicits a pleasurable emotion that motivates us to want to sing or dance. This is why it is very important to use songs or music with older adults with dementia that come from their childhood or young adult years because those types of songs they associate with the most can tap into their long-term memory store and elicit an emotional response to an old memory. So much so, that it may be pleasant enough for them to want to speak again, or more than they usually have been, through either singing or conversation.

For example, my grandmother had Alzheimer’s Disease back when I was studying music therapy and she was staring off into space and not speaking, but when I sang “Amazing Grace” one time her affect lit up and she started crying. Then she was talking coherently for the first time in a long time about the song and, while the conversation was short, it was amazing. Music has this ability to tap into our emotions and memories that other activities are unable to. This is also why it is important to use a person’s preferred music they like or have a personal or cultural association with to elicit a specific response from them that benefits their overall well-being from a health and wellness perspective. This is especially true if you are wanting to induce meaningful behavioral modification via mood through the “iso-principle.”