How Listening To Music While Driving May Help Heart Health

Driving is stressful, especially if you are a new and inexperienced driver or stuck in heavy traffic. As with all stressful situations, this can take a toll on the health of your heart. 

However, new research featured in the journal Complementary Therapies in Medicine has indicated that listening to music while driving significantly reduced cardiac stress in the study participants.

Read More: Visual Habits While Driving

How The Study Was Conducted

The study, conducted by researchers from São Paulo State University in Marília, Brazil, Oxford Brookes University in the United Kingdom, and the University of Parma in Italy, used female test subjects who were not habitual drivers.

The subjects were then asked to drive for 20 minutes during rush hour on a 3-kilometer route in one of the busiest parts of the city of Marília in cars that were not their own and without listening to music.

After monitoring the heart rate of the test subjects during the test drive, the researchers then asked the test subjects to complete the same driving test, but this time listening to instrumental music.

After analyzing the results, the researchers showed that the test subjects’ heart rates were lower overall when listening to music in the same stressful situation.

How Music Keeps You Calm When Driving

The study has theorized that music impacts both the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. 

The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for regulating the fight-or-flight response, releasing adrenaline and other stress hormones in response to anxiety-inducing situations, and raising the heart rate.

It was suggested that listening to instrumental music helps to calm and focus the mind of those experiencing stressful situations, dampening the effect of the sympathetic nervous system’s fight-or-flight response and enhancing the parasympathetic nervous system’s “rest and digest” process.

The team has argued that, according to the results of this small-scale experiment, listening to relaxing music could improve the stress levels of those in anxiety-inducing traffic conditions, preventing stress levels from escalating and affecting the heart health of the driver.