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Music at workplace increase cooperative and supportive
Posted on: 31/Aug/2016 9:37:40 AM
A new study has said that exposure to happy music has the power to make the workplace more cooperative and supportive. The study was conducted by researchers at the Cornell University in the US. The research was published in the Journal of Organisational Behaviour.
To test the effect of different types of music the cooperative behaviour of individuals working as a team, the researchers conducted two studies. For each study, participants were grouped into teams of three. Each team member was given multiple opportunities to either contribute to the team`s value using tokens or keep the tokens for personal use.
It was found that when happy, upbeat music was played, team members were more likely to contribute to the group`s value. When music deemed unpleasant was played, participants were has likely to keep tokens for themselves. The researchers found contribution levels to the public good when happy, upbeat songs were played were approximately one-third higher compared to the less pleasant music. When researchers conducted a second experiment testing how people react when no music is played, the results were the same. The researchers concluded that happy music provokes people to more often make decisions that contribute to the good of the team.
Speaking about this, the researchers said, Music is a pervasive part of much of our daily lives, whether we consciously notice it or not. Music might melt into the background in places like supermarkets or gyms and other times it`s very prominent like places of worship or presidential nominating conventions. Our results show that people seem more likely to get into sync with each other if they`re listening to music that has a steady beat to it. What is great about these findings, other than having a scientific reason to blast tunes at work, is that happy music has the power to make the workplace more cooperative and supportive overall.
