Heavy metal music may help people tolerate pain better, study finds
Listening to heavy metal music at a festival may help people endure pain for longer, a new study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, suggests, although it did not make pain feel less intense or unpleasant, Qazinform News Agency correspondent reports.
Researchers studied 122 participants at Germany’s Wacken Open Air heavy metal festival in 2023. They compared 60 people tested the day before the festival with 62 people tested on the third and fourth days of the event. Participants were asked to place their hand and forearm in cold water and keep them there as long as they could tolerate it.
When all participants were analyzed, researchers found no significant difference in pain tolerance, sensitivity or unpleasantness between the two groups. However, after excluding 14 participants who reported heavy alcohol consumption, those tested during the festival were able to tolerate the pain for longer than those tested before it.
The researchers say this may point to a temporary increase in resilience, meaning participants were better able to endure an unpleasant experience rather than feeling less pain.
The effect may have been linked to the intense festival experience, including live music, social interaction, physical activity and excitement. The researchers also suggested that music may influence the release of oxytocin, a hormone involved in social bonding and pain regulation, but they did not measure hormone levels, making this explanation speculative.
The researchers noted that the participants were mostly German metal fans and that Wacken Open Air has a particularly friendly and inclusive reputation. It therefore remains unclear whether the same effect would occur at other metal festivals or at music festivals more generally.
Earlier, Qazinform News Agency reported on why some people don’t enjoy music.