Monkey melodies inspired by the animals' calls had a calming effect, hinting at how human music may have evolved

This article is more than 11 years old

This article is more than 11 years old

Music inspired by the soothing calls of contented monkeys relaxes the animals when it is played back to them, researchers have discovered.

Researchers composed "monkey melodies" to investigate whether non-human primates are capable of responding to music with the same emotions as people.

They found that while monkeys were left cold by human music, they reacted emotionally to tunes that incorporated features commonly heard in monkey calls, such as rising and falling tones.

Tamarin monkeys lounged around and ate more when they heard music inspired by the calming sounds the animals make when they are safe, the study found.

Music based on more fearful monkey calls made the animals agitated and anxious when it was played in their enclosure.

The study, published today in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, will help psychologists understand the evolutionary roots of music and its effect on the brain, the authors said.

"The emotional components of music and animal calls might be very similar, and from an evolutionary perspective, we are finding that the note patterns, dissonance and timing are important for communicating affective states in both animals and people," said Chuck Snowdon, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

The findings suggest that the vocal characteristics of tamarin calls evolved to spread calming or anxious feelings throughout groups of the animals.

Snowdon teamed up with David Teie, a cellist with the American National Symphony Orchestra, to investigate whether humans were alone in responding emotionally to music.

In the study, 14 cotton-top tamarins were played 30-second blasts of music while the researchers noted any changes in their behaviour. The animals were played Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings and a soft piano piece from The Fragile by rock band Nine Inch Nails, followed by Metallica's Of Wolf and Man and an excerpt from The Grudge by rock band Tool.

They then heard the specially composed monkey music.

The only human music that elicited any response was the heavy metal band Metallica, whose music had the unexpected effect of calming the monkeys.

The research could lead to a rethink of animal husbandry guidelines, as it showed that monkeys rarely respond positively to human music. "Lots of primate research laboratories use radios to provide what is called 'enrichment' for their animals, but you can't expect another species to be interested in our music just because we are human," Snowdon said. "Why should a tamarin find our music comforting? I find the monkey music quite irritating."

Josh McDermott, an expert on music perception in primates at the Centre for Neural Science at New York University, agreed. "This work shows monkeys don't respond to human music. They might be more comforted if these more familiar sounds were played to them."