Music: Does It Help or Hurt Study Habits?

By Carter Helschien

Most parents have been there: they expect their son or daughter to be doing homework when all of the sudden they hear loud music playing from his or her room. Therefore parents should immediately assume that their teenager isn’t doing homework, right? Wrong. In fact, odds are the music is helping their son or daughter more than they realize.

At one point or another most parents will realize that their son or daughter has a short attention span, as can be expected of almost any teenager. Consequently, listening to music while completing homework or studying can be extremely beneficial to some teens, as the music in the background can help a teen to focus on the task at hand. The reason for this is that we as teenagers find it easier, paradoxically, to focus on an assignment with something that distracts some of our attention away from the task at hand.

A large portion of an average teenager’s homework can be simple time-consuming busywork. As a result, music helps combat the urge to procrastinate and to not even bother starting the daunting task by making the busywork seem more bearable. When I start an assignment, I convince myself that I will only work until the song ends and then I will take a break. By the end of the song, however, I am already more than halfway through my assignment, so I decide that I may as well finish and play another song to keep my mind from wandering.

Moreover, by studying information as we listen to a specific rhythm of a song, it becomes easier for us to recall the information later-on by simply remembering the rhythm of the song. For example, if I am studying a long list of vocabulary words, I might play one of my favorite songs in my room to help me keep focused on my task. Consequently, when it comes time for me to be tested on the vocabulary words, and I am stuck trying to remember I word, I try to remember the song I was listening to and see if that helps jog my memory. Remarkably, it works and I remember the word I had forgotten.

Though music always has a potential to distract a teenager, parents should realize that odds are listening to music will help most teenagers. If, however, parents let their son or daughter listen to music and still does not help him or her to focus on a given task, then parents should make music a reward for completing an assignment. For example, if the teen completes one assignment he or she can listen to one song, and so on. In the end, music has enormous potential to greatly help teenagers struggling to form good study habits.