Classical Music and Cognitive Tasks

Areas of Science	Music
Difficulty
Time Required	Long (2-4 weeks)

*Note: For this science project you will need to develop your own experimental procedure. Use the information in the summary tab as a starting place. If you would like to discuss your ideas or need help troubleshooting, use the Ask An Expert forum. Our Experts won't do the work for you, but they will make suggestions and offer guidance if you come to them with specific questions.

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Abstract

Does listening to classical music help or hinder concentration and performance on cognitive tasks? You'll need help from a teacher to design two short, age-appropriate worksheet tests for this experiment. The tests should be of equal difficulty. You'll also need the cooperation of several additional classroom teachers in order to test enough students (at least 50-100, see the Science Buddies resource: How Many Participants Do I Need?). Half the students will take test A while listening to classical music and test B with no background music. The other half of the students will take test B while listening to classical music and test A with no background music. Analyze the scores to see if there are differences in performance between the music and non-music conditions. You should also be able to show that the two tests are equally difficult under the same conditions (or use the averaged results to correct for any difference in difficulty between the two tests). (Ritblatt, 2004)

Bibliography

Ritblatt, N.S., 2004. "How Does Classical Music Affect Cognitive Tasks in K–1st Grade Children?" California State Science Fair Abstract [accessed August 23, 2006] http://cssf.usc.edu/History/2004/Projects/J1716.pdf

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MLA Style

Science Buddies Staff. "Classical Music and Cognitive Tasks." Science Buddies, 28 July 2017, https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Music_p003/music/classical-music-improve-cognitive-tasks. Accessed 12 Aug. 2020.

APA Style

Science Buddies Staff. (2017, July 28). Classical Music and Cognitive Tasks. Retrieved from https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Music_p003/music/classical-music-improve-cognitive-tasks

Last edit date: 2017-07-28

Experimental Procedure

For this science project you will need to develop your own experimental procedure. Use the information in the summary tab as a starting place. If you would like to discuss your ideas or need help troubleshooting, use the Ask An Expert forum. Our Experts won't do the work for you, but they will make suggestions and offer guidance if you come to them with specific questions.

If you want a Project Idea with full instructions, please pick one without an asterisk (*) at the end of the title.

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Abstract

Bibliography