This study investigated the effects of background music on cognition, evaluations of films and attitudes. We replicated an earlier experiment by Brosius (1990) on the effects of background music on memory and evaluations of informational films. Using the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM, see Petty & Cacioppo, 1986) as a theoretical framework, we predicted that music would have negative effects on the central route of processing (recognition) but positive effects on the peripheral route (evaluations, changes in attitudes) of the ELM. A television report on toxic substances in energy-saving lamps served as the basic stimulus. Five versions of the report were presented: one with no music and four additional versions with high/low valence/arousal background music. Using a five-group between-subjects design (with approximately 100 members in each group), stimuli were rated in an online study with a representative sample of “consumers” (age range: 18–60 years). The changes in attitudes toward energy-saving lamps and the overall evaluations of the video were measured using pre- and post-test questionnaires. In addition, the subjects completed recognition tests for both the auditory and visual information. No differences in recognition or the evaluations were found between the conditions, and no effects of the valence of the music (i.e., negative vs. positive) were found. Furthermore, there was a pre-post shift in attitudes toward a critical evaluation of energy-saving lamps (dz = 0.85). However, this intervention effect was independent of the experimental condition. Overall, our study found no support for the widely assumed manipulative effect of background music in television news magazines. The results are discussed in relation to the habituation effects of music and the perceived relevance of background music.
AnisfeldM.LambertW. E. (1966). When are pleasant words learned faster than unpleasant words?Journal of Verbal Learning & Verbal Behavior, 5(2), 132–141.
3.
AronsonE.WilsonT. D.AkertR. M. (1999). Social psychology. New York, NY: Longman.
4.
BehneK.-E. (1999). Zu einer Theorie der Wirkungslosigkeit von (Hintergrund-)Musik [Towards a theory of ineffectiveness of background music]. Musikpsychologie, 14, 7–23.
5.
BoeckmannK.NessmannK.PetermandlM.StücklerH. (1990). On the influence of background music on recall and appraisal in educational films. Educational Media International, 27(3), 172–180.
6.
BoltzM.SchulkindM.KantraS. (1991). Effects of background music on the remembering of filmed events. Memory & Cognition, 19(6), 593–606.
7.
BondT.FoxC. M. (2007). Applying the Rasch model (2nd ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
8.
BradleyM. M.GreenwaldM. K.PetryM. C.LangP. J. (1992). Remembering pictures: Pleasure and arousal in memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 18(2), 379–390.
9.
BradleyM. M.LangP. J. (2000). Affective reactions to acoustic stimuli. Psychophysiology, 37(2), 204–215.
10.
BrosiusH.-B. (1990). Bewertung gut, Behalten schlecht: Die Wirkung von Musik in Informationsfilmen [Good evaluation, bad memory: The effect of music in information films]. Medienpsychologie, 2(1), 44–55.
11.
BrownS. (2006). Introduction: “How does music work?” Toward a pragmatics of musical communication. In BrownS.VolgstenU. (Eds.), Music and manipulation: On the social uses and social control of music (pp. 1–27). New York, NY: Berghahn Books.
12.
BullerjahnC. (2006). The effectiveness of music in television commercials: A comparison of theoretical approaches. In BrownS.VolgstenU. (Eds.), Music and manipulation: On the social uses and social control of music (pp. 207–235). New York, NY: Berghahn Books.
13.
BullerjahnC.GüldenringM. (1994). An empirical investigation of effects of film music using qualitative content analysis. Psychomusicology, 13(1–2), 99–118.
14.
CalvertG., A.SpenceC.SteinB. E. (Eds.). (2004). The handbook of multisensory processes. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
15.
CohenA. J. (2001). Music as a source of emotion in film. In JuslinP. N.SlobodaJ. A. (Eds.), Music and emotion: Theory and research (pp. 249–272). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
16.
CohenA. J. (2010). Music as a source of emotion in film. In JuslinP. N.SlobodaJ. A. (Eds.), Handbook of music and emotion: Theory, research, applications (pp. 879–908). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
17.
CohenJ. (1988). Statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences (2nd ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
18.
dBSONIC (2004) (Version 4.4) [Computer software for psychoacoustic analysis. For description, seehttp://www.01dB-metravib.com]. Limonest, France: 01dB-Metravib.
19.
DöbenD. (1989). Musik und Information: Zur Verwendung und Funktion von Musik in Fernsehsendungen mit politischer Aussage [Music and information: The use and function of music in political television magazines]. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Paderborn, Germany.
20.
EgermannH.KopiezR.ReuterC. (2006). Is there an effect of subliminal messages in music on choice behavior?Journal of Articles in Support of the Null Hypothesis, 4(2), 29–46 (online journal: http://www.jasnh.com).
21.
EllisP. D. (2010). The essential guide to effect sizes. Statistical power, meta-analysis, and the interpretation of research results. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
22.
EschrichS.MünteT. F.AltenmüllerE. (2008). Unforgettable film music: The role of emotion in episodic long-term memory for music. BMC Neuroscience, 9(48).
23.
FaulF.ErdfelderE.LangA.-G.BuchnerA. (2007). G*Power 3: A flexible statistical power analysis program for the social, behavioral, and biomedical sciences. Behavior Research Methods, 39(2), 175–191.
24.
FrithS. (1996). Performing rites: Evaluating popular music. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
25.
GreweO.KopiezR.AltenmüllerE. (2009). The chill parameter: Goose bumps and shivers as promising measures in emotion research. Music Perception, 27(1), 61–74.
26.
GreweO.NagelF.KopiezR.AltenmüllerE. (2007). Emotions over time: Synchronicity and development of subjective, physiological, and facial affective reactions to music. Emotion, 7(4), 774–788.
27.
HenrichJ.HeineS. J.NorenzayanA. (2010). The weirdest people in the world?Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33(2–3), 61–83.
28.
HungK. (2000). Narrative music in congruent and incongruent TV advertising. Journal of Advertising, 29(1), 25–34.
JohnsonB. T.EaglyA. H. (1989). Effects of involvement on persuasion: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 106(2), 290–314.
31.
KämpfeJ.SedlmeierP.RenkewitzF. (2011). The impact of background music on adult listeners: A meta-analysis. Psychology of Music, 39(4), 424–448.
32.
KensingerE. A.CorkinS. (2003). Memory enhancement for emotional words: Are emotional words more vividly remembered than neutral words?Memory & Cognition, 31(8), 1169–1180.
KlatzkyR. L. (1980). Human memory: Structures and processes (2nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: W. H. Freeman.
35.
KreutzG.OttU.TeichmannD.OsawaP.VaitlD. (2008). Using music to induce emotions: Influences of musical preference and absorption. Psychology of Music, 36(1), 101–126.
36.
LaBarK. S.PhelpsE. A. (1998). Arousal-mediated memory consolidation: Role of the medial temporal lobe in humans. Psychological Science, 9(6), 490–493.
37.
LalwaniA. K.LwinM. O.LingP. B. (2009). Does audiovisual congruency in advertisements increase persuasion? The role of cultural music and products. Journal of Global Marketing, 22(2), 139–153.
38.
LaneR. D.NadelL. (2000). Cognitive neuroscience of emotion. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
39.
McDermottJ.HauserM. (2004). Are consonant intervals music to their ears? Spontaneous acoustic preferences in a nonhuman primate. Cognition, 94(2), B11–B21.
40.
MoormannP. (2010). Subtile Manipulation? Zur Musikgestaltung von Politikmagazinen [Subtle manipulation? Music design in television news magazines]. In MoormannP. (Ed.), Musik im Fernsehen. Sendeformen und Gestaltungsprinzipien (pp. 83–90). Wiesbaden, Germany: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.
41.
NagelF.KopiezR.GreweO.AltenmüllerE. (2007). EMuJoy – Software for continuous measurement of perceived emotions in music. Behavior Research Methods, 39(2), 283–290.
42.
NorthA. C.HargreavesD. J. (2010). Music and marketing. In JuslinP. N.SlobodaJ. A. (Eds.), Handbook of music and emotion: Theory, research, applications (pp. 909–930). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
43.
PettyR.CacioppoJ. T. (1986). The Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 19, 123–205.
44.
PlatzF.KopiezR. (2012). When the eye listens: A meta-analysis of how audio-visual presentation enhances the appreciation of music performance. Music Perception, 30(1), 71–83.
45.
ReefmannN.WechslerB.GygaxL. (2009). Behavioral and physiological assessment of positive and negative emotion in sheep. Animal Behaviour, 78(3), 651–659.
46.
ReipsU.-D. (2002a). Internet-based psychological experimenting: Five dos and five dont’s. Social Science Computer Review, 20(3), 241–249.
47.
ReipsU.-D. (2002b). Standards for internet-based experimenting. Experimental Psychology, 49(4), 243–256.
48.
RostJ.von DavierM. (1994). A conditional item fit index for Rasch models. Applied Psychological Measurement, 18(2), 171–182.
49.
RussellJ. A. (1980). A circumplex model of affect. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 39(6), 1161–1178.
50.
SchellenbergE. G. (2006). Exposure to music: The truth about the consequences. In McPhersonG. E. (Ed.), The child as musician: A handbook of musical development (pp. 111–134). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
51.
SchererK. R. (2001). Appraisal considered as a process of multilevel sequential checking. In SchererK. R.SchorrA.JohnstoneT. (Eds.), Appraisal processes in emotion: Theory, methods, research (pp. 92–120). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
52.
SchwartzS. (1970). Film music and attitude change: A study to determine the effect of manipulating a musical soundtrack upon changes in attitude toward militarism-pacifism held by tenth grade social studies students (Doctoral dissertation). Available from ProQuest. (#7110977)
53.
SchwarzG. (1978). Estimating the dimension of a model. Analysis of Statistics, 6(2), 461–464.
54.
SherifM.CantrilH. (1947). The psychology of ego involvements: Social attitudes and identifications. New York, NY: Wiley.
55.
TaggP.ClaridaB. (2003). Ten little title tunes. Towards a musicology of the mass media. New York, NY: The Mass Media Musicologists’ Press.
56.
ThompsonW. F.SchellenbergE. G.LetnicA. K. (2012). Fast and loud background music disrupts reading comprehension. Psychology of Music, 40(6), 700–708.
57.
VandenBosG. R. (Ed.). (2007). APA dictionary of psychology. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
58.
von DavierM. (2001). WINMIRA 2001 (Computer software). Groningen, Germany: Science Plus Group.
59.
WegenerC. (2002). Trotz Gegewind im Markt behauptet: Politische Fernsehmagazine im Zeitalter des Infotainments [Holding its ground in face of blowback: Television news magazines in the age of infotainment]. In SchichaC.BrosdaC. (Eds.), Musikvermittlung in Unterhaltungsformaten: Medieninszenierungen zwischen Popularität und Populismus [Conveyance of music in entertainment formats: Media stagings between popularity and populism] (pp. 210–222). Münster, Germany: LIT.
60.
WilsonE. J.SherrellD. L. (1993). Source effects in communication and persuasion research: A meta-analysis. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 21(2), 101–112.
61.
WirthW.SchrammH. (2007). Emotionen und Emotionsregulation bei der Medienrezeption aus appraisaltheoretischer Perspektive [Emotions and regulation of emotions in media reception from the perspective of appraisal theory]. In TrepteS.WitteE. H. (Eds.),Sozialpsychologie und Medien [Social psychology and media] (pp. 35–59). Lengerich, Germany: Pabst Science Publishers.
62.
YeohJ. P. S.NorthA. C. (2010). The effect of musical fit on consumers’ memory. Psychology of Music, 38(3), 368–378.
63.
ZimmermanP. H.BuijsS. A. F.BolhuisJ. E.KeelingL. J. (2011). Behaviour of domestic fowl in anticipation of positive and negative stimuli. British Journal of Animal Behaviour, 81(3), 569–577.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
