Exploring the Decision-Making Process behind Illicit Drug Use at Music Festivals.

Background: Illicit substance use is common at music festivals. One could question whether festival attendees deliberately plan to take drugs at such events or whether their illicit (poly)drug use is provoked by specific circumstances, such as the presence of peers or a general belief that others are using drugs at the festival. Objectives: The present study implemented the prototype willingness model, which is a model that assesses whether illicit drug use at music festivals is rather a rational or a more spontaneous decision-making process. Results: A three-wave panel survey was conducted, questioning festival attendees before (n = 304, 60.86% males), during, and after music festival visits. In total, 186 people (59.68% males) between 18 and 55 years (M = 27.80 years; SD = 8.19) completed all three surveys, of which 62.9% had taken one or more different illicit substances at the festival. Positive attitudes toward illicit drug consumption were most firmly related to attendees' intentions to take drugs at festivals. Additionally, the more festival visitors identified themselves with the prototype of an attendee using drugs, the more likely they were to be willing to use them. The perceived presence of illicit substances at such events was also strongly related to the actual behavior. Conclusion: The findings suggest that illicit drug use at music festivals relates to both a rational choice and an unplanned one.

Concert experiences in virtual reality environments.

Spurred by recent advances in digital technologies, virtual concerts have become established modes for event attendance and represent a rapidly growing segment of the music industry. Yet, up to now, general experience of virtual concert attendees remains largely underexplored. Here, we focus on a subcategory in this domain: music concerts in virtual reality (VR). Our approach is situated within the theoretical framework of embodied music cognition and entailed investigation through a survey study. Responses of seventy-four VR concert attendees were collected, consisting of demographics, motivations, experiences, and future perspectives. In contrast to previous research, which generally identified social connectedness as a main motivator for concert attendance, our sample regarded it as one of the least important incentives. On the other hand, in line with previous studies, 'seeing specific artists perform' and 'uniqueness of the experience', were pivotal. The latter was mostly fueled by the possibility to experience/interact with visuals and environments considered as unconceivable in the real world. Furthermore, 70% of our sample regarded VR concerts as 'the future of the music industry', mainly relating to the accessibility of such events. Positive evaluations of VR concert experiences, as well as future perspectives regarding the medium, were significantly influenced by the level of experienced immersivity. To our knowledge, this is the first study to provide such an account. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10055-023-00814-y.

Substance Use and Attendance Motives of Electronic Dance Music (EDM) Event Attendees: A Survey Study.

EDM event attendees are a high-risk population for substance use and associated adverse effects. The aim of this study was to examine substance use at EDM events, focusing on associations between attendance motives and substance use. Sociodemographic characteristics, event specifics, past-year use, and attendance motives were assessed through an online survey. Participants were 1345 Belgian EDM event attendees (69.44% male, Mage = 22.63, SDage = 4.03). Ecstasy/MDMA/Molly (52.28%), other synthetic hallucinogens (53.68%), ketamine (42.13%), amphetamines (40.45%), and alkyl nitrites (poppers) (32.76%) were most frequently used at festivals/outdoor parties/raves. In nightclubs, cocaine (32.29%) was shown to be prevalent as well, while other synthetic hallucinogens (15.79%) were less often consumed. At events with a more private character, cannabis (68.88%) and magic mushrooms (66.44%) were most frequently used. Aside from alcohol (47.76%), substance use in pubs/bars was negligible. Overall enjoyment was demonstrated to be the key attendance motive, which was succeeded by those relating to music and socialization. A wide range of motives proved to be more important to users (e.g., dance, exploration, escapism, excitement, alcohol, drugs) than non-users, while some were associated with the use of particular substances. The prevalence of substance use was shown to be dependent on the specifics of the setting. Moreover, the idea of a three-dimensional classification of the most principal motives for music event attendance was supported. Finally, correlations were estimated between attendance motives and substance use as well as specific substances. Results could enable more tailored approaches in prevention and harm reduction efforts as well as event management strategies.

Impact of Lockdown Measures on Joint Music Making: Playing Online and Physically Together.

A wide range of countries decided to go into lockdown to contain the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic of 2020, a setting separating people and restricting their movements. We investigated how musicians dealt with this sudden restriction in mobility. Responses of 234 people were collected. The majority of respondents (95%) resided in Belgium or the Netherlands. Results indicated a decrease of 79% of live music making in social settings during lockdown compared with before lockdown. In contrast, an increase of 264% was demonstrated for online joint music making. However, results showed that most respondents were largely or even completely unaccustomed with specialized platforms for online joint music making (e.g., JamKazam, Jamulus). Respondents reported to mostly use well-known video-conferencing platforms such as Zoom and Skype when playing together virtually. However, when such video-conferencing platforms were used, they were often not employed for synchronized playing and were generally reported to insufficiently deal with latency issues. Furthermore, respondents depending on music making as their main source of income explored online real-time methods significantly more than those relying on other income sources. Results also demonstrated an increase of 93% in the use of alternative remote joint music-making methods (e.g., recording parts separately and subsequently circulating these digital recordings). All in all, results of this study provide a more in-depth view on joint music making during the first weeks of lockdown induced by the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, and demonstrate users' perceptions of performance and usability of online real-time platforms as well as alternative methods for musical interaction.

BeatWalk: Personalized Music-Based Gait Rehabilitation in Parkinson's Disease.

Taking regular walks when living with Parkinson's disease (PD) has beneficial effects on movement and quality of life. Yet, patients usually show reduced physical activity compared to healthy older adults. Using auditory stimulation such as music can facilitate walking but patients vary significantly in their response. An individualized approach adapting musical tempo to patients' gait cadence, and capitalizing on these individual differences, is likely to provide a rewarding experience, increasing motivation for walk-in PD. We aim to evaluate the observance, safety, tolerance, usability, and enjoyment of a new smartphone application. It was coupled with wearable sensors (BeatWalk) and delivered individualized musical stimulation for gait auto-rehabilitation at home. Forty-five patients with PD underwent a 1-month, outdoor, uncontrolled gait rehabilitation program, using the BeatWalk application (30 min/day, 5 days/week). The music tempo was being aligned in real-time to patients' gait cadence in a way that could foster an increase up to +10% of their spontaneous cadence. Open-label evaluation was based on BeatWalk use measures, questionnaires, and a six-minute walk test. Patients used the application 78.8% (±28.2) of the prescribed duration and enjoyed it throughout the program. The application was considered "easy to use" by 75% of the patients. Pain, fatigue, and falls did not increase. Fear of falling decreased and quality of life improved. After the program, patients improved their gait parameters in the six-minute walk test without musical stimulation. BeatWalk is an easy to use, safe, and enjoyable musical application for individualized gait rehabilitation in PD. It increases "walk for exercise" duration thanks to high observance. Clinical Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02647242.

Instructed versus spontaneous entrainment of running cadence to music tempo.

Matching exercise behavior to musical beats has been shown to favorably affect repetitive endurance tasks. In this study, our aim was to explore the role of spontaneous versus instructed entrainment, focusing on self-paced exercise of healthy, recreational runners. For three 4-min running tasks, 33 recreational participants were either running in silence or with music; when running with music, either no instructions were given to entrain to the music, or participants were instructed to match their running cadence with the tempo of the music. The results indicated that less entrainment occurred when no instruction to match the exercise with the musical tempo was provided. In addition, similar to the condition without music, lower speeds and shorter step lengths were observed when runners were instructed to match their running behavior to the musical tempo when compared with the condition without such instruction. Our findings demonstrate the impact of instruction on running performance and stress the importance of intention to entrain running behavior to musical beats.

Corrigendum: Musical Intensity Applied in the Sports and Exercise Domain: An Effective Strategy to Boost Performance?

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01145.].

Musical Intensity Applied in the Sports and Exercise Domain: An Effective Strategy to Boost Performance?

In the sports and exercise domain, it has been suggested that musical intensity might boost performance. Previous research revealed that pumping up the volume of music might increase running speed, grip strength, and choice reaction time while simultaneously decreasing time to exhaustion and level of perceived exhaustion. However, evidence is still scarce, experimental designs and tested groups vary significantly, and contradicting evidence exists as well. Yet, listening to high-intensity music could be a risky business and exercisers employing such a strategy to improve performance are vulnerable to developing noise-induced hearing problems. Therefore, future research should inquire more profoundly into the inherent boosting qualities of musical intensity and juxtapose experimental results and auditory repercussions in order to uncover possible strategies to combine both in such a way that the exerciser's health can be safeguarded at all times.

Optimizing beat synchronized running to music.

The use of music and specifically tempo-matched music has been shown to affect running performance. But can we maximize the synchronization of movements to music and does maximum synchronization influence kinematics and motivation? In this study, we explore the effect of different types of music-to-movement alignment strategies on phase coherence, cadence and motivation. These strategies were compared to a control condition where the music tempo was deliberately not aligned to the running cadence. Results show that without relative phase alignment, a negative mean asynchrony (NMA) of footfall timings with respect to the beats is obtained. This means that footfalls occurred slightly before the beat and that beats were anticipated. Convergence towards this NMA or preferred relative phase angle was facilitated when the first music beat of a new song started close to the step, which means that entrainment occurred. The results also show that using tempo and phase alignment, the relative phase can be manipulated or forced in a certain angle with a high degree of accuracy. Ensuring negative angles larger than NMA (step before beat) results in increased motivation and decreasing cadence. Running in NMA or preferred relative phase angles results in a null effect on cadence. Ensuring a positive phase angle with respect to NMA results in higher motivation and higher cadence. None of the manipulations resulted in change in perceived exhaustion or a change in velocity. Results also indicate that gender plays an important role when using forced phase algorithms: effects were more pronounced for the female population than for the male population. The implementation of the proposed alignment strategies and control of beat timing while running opens possibilities optimizing the individual running cadence and motivation.

Spontaneous Velocity Effect of Musical Expression on Self-Paced Walking.

The expressive features of music can influence the velocity of walking. So far, studies used instructed (and intended) synchronization. But is this velocity effect still present with non-instructed (spontaneous) synchronization? To figure that out, participants were instructed to walk in their own comfort tempo on an indoor track, first in silence and then with tempo-matched music. We compared velocities of silence and music conditions. The results show that some music has an activating influence, increasing velocity and motivation, while other music has a relaxing influence, decreasing velocity and motivation. The influence of musical expression on the velocity of self-paced walking can be predicted with a regression model using only three sonic features explaining 56% of the variance. Phase-coherence between footfall and beat did not contribute to the velocity effect, due to its implied fixed pacing. The findings suggest that the velocity effect depends on vigor entrainment that influences both stride length and pacing. Our findings are relevant for preventing injuries, for gait improvement in walking rehabilitation, and for improving performance in sports activities.

Spontaneous Entrainment of Running Cadence to Music Tempo.

BACKGROUND: Since accumulating evidence suggests that step rate is strongly associated with running-related injuries, it is important for runners to exercise at an appropriate running cadence. As music tempo has been shown to be capable of impacting exercise performance of repetitive endurance activities, it might also serve as a means to (re)shape running cadence. The aim of this study was to validate the impact of music tempo on running cadence. METHODS: Sixteen recreational runners ran four laps of 200 m (i.e. 800 m in total); this task was repeated 11 times with a short break in between each four-lap sequence. During the first lap of a sequence, participants ran at a self-paced tempo without musical accompaniment. Running cadence of the first lap was registered, and during the second lap, music with a tempo matching the assessed cadence was played. In the final two laps, the music tempo was either increased/decreased by 3.00, 2.50, 2.00, 1.50, or 1.00 % or was kept stable. This range was chosen since the aim of this study was to test spontaneous entrainment (an average person can distinguish tempo variations of about 4 %). Each participant performed all conditions. RESULTS: Imperceptible shifts in musical tempi in proportion to the runner's self-paced running tempo significantly influenced running cadence (p < .001). Contrasts revealed a linear relation between the tempo conditions and adaptation in running cadence (p < .001). In addition, a significant effect of condition on the level of entrainment was revealed (p < .05), which suggests that maximal effects of music tempo on running cadence can only be obtained up to a certain level of tempo modification. Finally, significantly higher levels of tempo entrainment were found for female participants compared to their male counterparts (p < .05). CONCLUSIONS: The applicable contribution of these novel findings is that music tempo could serve as an unprompted means to impact running cadence. As increases in step rate may prove beneficial in the prevention and treatment of common running-related injuries, this finding could be especially relevant for treatment purposes, such as exercise prescription and gait retraining. KEY POINTS: Music tempo can spontaneously impact running cadence.A basin for unsolicited entrainment of running cadence to music tempo was discovered.The effect of music tempo on running cadence proves to be stronger for women than for men.

Recognizing induced emotions of happiness and sadness from dance movement.

Recent research revealed that emotional content can be successfully decoded from human dance movement. Most previous studies made use of videos of actors or dancers portraying emotions through choreography. The current study applies emotion induction techniques and free movement in order to examine the recognition of emotional content from dance. Observers (N = 30) watched a set of silent videos showing depersonalized avatars of dancers moving to an emotionally neutral musical stimulus after emotions of either sadness or happiness had been induced. Each of the video clips consisted of two dance performances which were presented side-by-side and were played simultaneously; one of a dancer in the happy condition and one of the same individual in the sad condition. After every film clip, the observers were asked to make forced-choices concerning the emotional state of the dancer. Results revealed that observers were able to identify the emotional state of the dancers with a high degree of accuracy. Moreover, emotions were more often recognized for female dancers than for their male counterparts. In addition, the results of eye tracking measurements unveiled that observers primarily focus on movements of the chest when decoding emotional information from dance movement. The findings of our study show that not merely portrayed emotions, but also induced emotions can be successfully recognized from free dance movement.