What We Can Learn about Happiness from Heavy Metal
typically
we associate happiness with success we
assume that becoming successful
will in turn make us happier i conducted
a poll amongst my peers in which i asked
them
whether they thought that becoming more
successful would make them happier
78 of them answered yes
this idea that happiness can be derived
from success is often imposed on us from
a young
age many of our parents tell us that in
order to be happy we need to be
successful and get good jobs
teachers tell us that in order to be
happy we need to get good grades we
could go to college and get these jobs
we’re constantly hearing that in order
to be happy we need to be successful as
well
listening can often cloud our judgment
of others when people
aren’t successful we make assumptions
about them for example
while we often associate classical
musicians with prodigies
we often associate heavy metal musicians
with high school dropouts
as a matter of fact heavy metal
musicians are often used as examples of
unsuccessfulness
the music is described as screaming and
poor life choices of their such as
dropping out of school and heavy
substance abuse are used as examples of
what not to do if you want to succeed
it has also been proven that there is a
negative correlation between heavy metal
music and success
according to russell goldenberg and dan
kopp only 21 out of 7 000 bands will
ever become moderately successful
while there are some that become famous
and succeed the genre as a whole as
stalson is a more angsty and
unsuccessful one
our judgments regarding heavy metal
music aren’t just limited to the
performers though
as we often judge listeners at the genre
just as much
we assume that they are unsuccessful and
lacking behind compared to the rest of
society
are these assumptions correct though in
part yes sixteen-year-old david merrill
was curious about the effects different
genres of music can have on our brains
he conducted an award-winning study
alongside with old dominion university
in which he assembled three groups of
mice
one was kept as a control group one was
exposed to classical music for seven
hours a day
and one was exposed to heavy metal music
for seven hours a day
he ran each group through the same maze
before starting the experiment to get an
indicator of what their times would
normally be
and over the course of the experiment he
ran each group through the same maze
three times a week over the course of
three weeks at the end
he ran them through the maze one final
time to see how the music had impacted
their brains
the control group’s time improved by
about five minutes
the group exposed to classical music
their time improved by about eight and a
half minutes
meanwhile the group exposed to heavy
metal music their time worsened by about
20 minutes
leaving it three times longer than the
initial 10.
so going off the results of the study
you can see that the heavy metal music
obviously had a detrimental cognitive
impact on the mice
and if we bind to the previous notion
that happiness is determined by success
we can assume that since the classical
medicine
and if we bind to the previous notion
that happiness can be determined by
success
we can assume that the mice exposed to
classical music is their time improved
the most will be the most happy insects
and successful
meanwhile the mice were exposed to heavy
metal music since their time worse than
the most they won’t be the least happy
and successful
to summarize what i’ve said so far many
of us associate happiness with success
we assume that becoming more successful
will in turn make us happier
many of us associate heavy metal music
with unsuccessfulness
and the experiment on the mice has
proven that heavy metal music can have a
detrimental cognitive
impact so isn’t it only logical
that heavy metal music would make you
less happy surprisingly the answer is no
according to scientific american in 2018
finland was the happiest country in the
world
the four countries right behind it and
happiness were norway
denmark iceland and switzerland placing
all five of the happiest countries in
the world in northern europe
interestingly finland the happiest out
of all of them
also has the most heavy metal bands per
capita in the entire world
with 53.2 metal bands for 100 000
residents
this is almost eight times higher than
the us’s 7.2 metal lands for 100 000
residents
i’d like to note that this is not just
an anomaly according to bloomberg city
lab
we found that the number of heavy metal
bans in a given country
is associated with its wealth and
affluence
at the country level number of heavy
metal bands per capita is positively
associated with a country’s economic
output per capita
levels of human creativity and
entrepreneurship share of adult and
college degrees
as well as overall levels of human
development well-being and satisfaction
with life
while it is unclear whether heavy metal
music was the sole cause of all of these
it has been proven to be a source of
happiness
in that same study bloomberg city lab
goes on to say that scandinavia’s
proclivity for heavy metal music has
increased its government’s efforts to
put compulsory music training into
schools
music training has been found to
increase students happiness
according to a specific study conducted
by paul v cisco arola
and thomas erolla regarding how
music training impacted students while
being at school
the result showed that extended music
training enhanced students quality of
life at school
particularly in areas related related to
general satisfaction about the school
as well as a sense of purpose and
achievement for students
this shows that heavy metal music has
contributed somewhat to these countries
exceptionally high levels of happiness
and from these following examples we can
also see
that despite some of the cognitive
consequences of heavy metal music
it has still proven to be a source of
happiness which leads me into my next
claim
that the idea that happiness is
determined by success
is inherently flawed many of the people
whom we proclaim to be most successful
are often child prodigies or geniuses we
recognize the enormous potential both of
these groups have from a young age as
they often stand out from their peers
and their cognitive abilities
however there’s also much research that
points to higher rates of mental illness
in both of these groups
according to scientific america for some
of the most talented
those with iqs in 140-150 range their
gifts can turn out to be a trap
because these children are so insightful
from such a young age able to make sense
of adult ideas
they are constantly aware of the
potential risk of failure
this awareness can immobilize them to
the point of emotional paralysis
a quiet demon parents and teachers must
watch out for
they go on to say that a steady diet of
frustration eats the child’s self-esteem
the result is anxiety which may even
shade into depression
as a defense the child gradually loses
interest in school and begins to isolate
themselves from social interaction
according to maggie ferguson an unhappy
childhood sticks with you
kim yong was a child prodigy from south
korea
now civil engineer in his 50s he feels
robbed of the childhood
he began speaking at six months and had
mastered four languages by the age of
two
he gained his first phd aged 8 and was
then head hunted to work for nasa
i led my life like a machine he said i
woke up
saw the daily assigned equation eights
left i was lonely and had no friends
even albert einstein one of the most
emblematic examples of genius wrote in
1952
it is strangely so universally and yet
feel so lonely
in these past few examples there is a
common thread to their unhappiness as
children
which is their difficulty in
communicating and forming relationships
with
others now in metal bands there are
often only a few members
these members need to know and be able
to work with each other very well
in addition to rehearsing and performing
together they often have to live with
each other for months on end when
touring
while the bands themselves aren’t always
necessarily successful
they do succeed at bringing members and
listeners together
according to psychologist tasha howe 80s
metal heads were significantly happier
and better adjusted than their peers and
current college students
while they found that the heavy metal
listeners were more likely to
live riskier lifestyles and make poor
decisions throughout their lives
the heavy metal listeners also reported
higher levels of youthful happiness and
that they’re less likely to have any
regrets
of anything they had done in their youth
the reason for this greater happiness
and adjustment
is because social support is a crucial
protective factor
for troubled youth musicians and fans of
like felt a kinship in the metal
community in a way to experience
heightened emotions with like-minded
people
that shows how important a sense of
community is to our happiness
live concerts are loved by almost all
people and are a key part of almost
every musical genre
there’s something special about seeing
your favorite band perform your favorite
songs right in front of you
according to us news amongst other
benefits such as stress reduction
live concerts can improve your
well-being through a sense of community
and connection
while you don’t know everyone in the
audience everyone has liking the band in
common
this common interest gives you a feeling
of belonging that cannot be rivaled by
listening to music on your own
so what am i trying to say essentially
i’m not here to say
you need heavy metal music in your life
in order to be happy
what i do want to get out of this is i
think the sentiment that happiness is
determined by success needs to be
forgotten
while we shouldn’t try to avoid success
in order to be happy
we shouldn’t use it as a means to try to
be happier
i think the biggest thing we can learn
about happiness from heavy metal music
is that happiness is not determined by
our achievements rather from a sense of
belonging and closeness with others
thank you
[Applause]