To explore these questions, the SCN lab is collaborating with the MuSci Lab in the Department of Musicology at the University of Oregon, directed by Professor Zach Wallmark.  The SCN and MuSci Labs are also currently working on a project that was recently funded by the Grammy Museum Grant Program to examine the correspondence of neural activation between empathic accuracy for people and music.

Music & Social Cognition

Music is a universal part of all human societies and helps to connect people. Empathy also brings people together and helps to develop and maintain healthy cooperative relationships. Given these similarities, a recently emerging view holds that individual differences in trait empathy—i.e., the tendency to understand and co-experience the cognitive and/or affective states of others—influence the way that we process music. However, very little is known about the relation between behaviorally assessed empathy, or empathic accuracy, for people and music. After several years of data collection, the lab currently has a paper under review addressing this question across two samples.