The power of music
1. Music has many functions, it is used for entertainment and also to control. Supermarkets and stores in general use music to help the consumer relax and hopefully buy more. Even elevators have their version - muzak. Music can also be a powerful source of healing. Pregnant women play music to their unborn babies to calm them and perhaps make them more creative. Quite often, when we're not feeling well, we might put on some music to feel better. More often than not, it tends to work.
2. Music is used in operating theatres as surgeons find that listening to classical composers like Mozart and Brahms, for example, reduces staff tension in the operating room. Some doctors even hook up their patients with earphones believing that music also helps relax the patient.
3. Doctors at the Rusk Rehabilitation Institute at New York University Medical Centre claim that music is better than medication, in that patients need less sedation and a shorter stay in hospital. Once home, convalescing to music, some patients are even able to forego their prescribed painkillers.
4. At California State University, psychologist Janet Lapp studied 30 migraine-headache sufferers over five weeks. Some of the 30 listened to their favourite music; others used relaxation techniques; a control group did neither. All three groups received similar medication. Music proved the most effective supplementary therapy, especially in the long term. Patients who continued to listen to music reported that headaches were less frequent, less severe and ended quicker.
5. So how does music help? Some studies show that it can lower blood pressure and respiration rates, thus lessening physiological responses to stress. Other studies suggest music may help increase production of endorphins (natural pain relievers). Whatever the medical reason may be, it is clear that music therapy is proving especially effective in its power to heal.
1. According to paragraph 1, music is manipulative in shopping centres because:
A. it aims to make people buy more
B. it's entertaining
C. it helps calm unborn babies
2. Paragraph 1 suggests that music:
A. relaxes people in elevators
B. has healing qualities
C. doesn't help creativity
3. Music is used in operating theatres because: (paragraph 2)
A. surgeons like Mozart and Brahms
B. patients like it
C. it helps staff and patients to relax
4. In paragraph 3 it is claimed that music used in hospitals is:
A. used instead of medication
B. used as a sedative
C. reduces the amount of medication needed
5. A word in paragraph 3 that means recovering or healing is:
A. forego
B. convalescing
C. prescribed
6. Migraine sufferers who listen to music (paragraph 4):
A. use relaxation techniques
B. don't need medication
C. suffer less
ANSWERS : 1. A; 2. B; 3. C; 4. C; 5. B; 6. C.
