Ethos

Introduction

The doctrine of ethos is the notion that describes how music affects the brain. Ethos or music psychology is a branch of musicology and psychology. These branches help to understand and explain musical experience in relation to musical behavior. The basic interpretations of the primary source help the systems observation approach and the systematic interaction with humans. This research paper seeks to explore the questions and issues that surround musical activities and experiences.

Doctrine of Ethos

There are many things that come in through senses of human beings. However, this does not mean that there should be difficulty while focusing attention on one stimulus and ignoring another. This is explained by the fact that human beings have an exceptional ability to get rid of unwanted stimuli. Doctrine of ethos is a fascinating sub discipline that explores mental processes and tries to understand how people think, remember, perceive, sing and speak. This branch of musical psychology can be also related to other disciplines such as linguistics and neuroscience. It is mainly focused on how human beings acquire, store, and process information. Research requires many different musical practical applications[1]. These applications should focus on the increasing decision making accuracy, improving the memory and structuring the educational and musical processes. Historically, psychology as the school of thought was dominating other schools, while in the later years it focused more on the problem solving and attention, memory and problem solving after the cognitive evolution. It is necessary to note that behaviorism focuses on the behaviors observed while cognitive psychology focuses on the internal mental states of human beings.

The critical question is “why it is necessary to study the doctrine of ethos?” Ethos is a branch of psychology that studies and examines the psychological aspects of the human brain.  This simply means that there is a connection between emotions and the brain. It is studied by teachers, educators, scientists, architects, artists, designers, musicians and many other professionals[2]. This psychology evolves around the idea and the notion that understanding the mind and internal processes is the key to understanding the relationship between human emotions and the brain. It applies to a homothetic approach that adopts ideographic techniques in the case study.

How the Doctrine of Ethos Pertains to Music

The doctrine of ethos pertains to music in several ways. It is necessary to note that tonal qualities and sounds are triggered by a part of the brain which in turn, releases hormones into the body. These hormones change the mood of a person drastically. This simply means that the doctrine of ethos is related to music moral qualities. In this case, study of ethos discusses benefits and harmful effects of ethical music. Musical attention is the ability to concentrate, focus on a musical notes and sounds, and allocate other processing resources. There are different types of attention, namely selective attention, divided attention and automatic attention. Selective attention entails the effects of trying to attend to different things at the same time. In this case, the person needs to select the task to attend in order to finish another. Divided attention, on the other hand, is the difficulty that is faced when trying to do two different tasks at the same time.

Hypothesis

  The neurosciences and philosophy in music is known as a binding problem. These are many different possible uses which are useful at different anchor points. The process by which brains segregate musical elements is not unique but also highly complex. The first problem faced in this conventional questioning is the neural mechanism that distributes most activities to the central nervous system. Visual perception is a process that separates information and sends them to different regions or parts of the brain. Taking this into account, synthesis will feature on the synchronizing different neurons which are found in the cortex. Memory also largely depends on the biding problem[3]. This simply means that it is associated with many different elements which help to maintain and create brain association. The binding problem is applied to unity consciousness in relation to a problem within the brain. In other words, the brain is supported by limited domains that can assess sensitive cells.

Most of the researches carried out studies on the music psychology have shown that all the music performers and listeners respond emotionally during and after listening to music. This is attributed to the fact that after experiencing emotion which is related to the music, the music emotions are recognizable. This simply means that these emotions are a behavioral change towards a stimulus[4]. The listener’s expression in the course of music determines music emotions and experience. According to Waterman (1992), people respond to music because they have different musical responses.

Method

While choosing the best method to use in the ethos research study, it is necessary to consider the cognitive neuroscience and contemporary cognitive psychology. The methods chosen must focus on auditory attention. This simply means that the method should be introduced using a limited capacity in the attention given. The first method should try to understand human behavior and how music is processed. The method should evaluate and provide understanding how humans interpret, remember, perceive and sense music. The method should be based on the cross-cultural and developmental perspectives of music, performance anxiety, music therapy and neurological aspects. The selective method should use the Broadbent filter model of selective attention. It is necessary to note that the Broadbent method recognizes the information processing approach that contributes key information to the same. Broadbent argues that any information provided at any time has the capacity to enter a sensory buffer[5]. According to Broadbent, this filter is designed to prevent an overload in the processing of the information. This method entails focusing on how people are listening to the music deliberately overloading with this information and how to read such a signal in the information process. This method also focuses on a repeated background. Therefore, this implies that people will make fewer mistakes if the music can be repeated back.

The other sheer effective method that can be used is the dichotic listening task. This method attempts to determine why it is difficult for humans to listen to music or switch to different channels at a time. This simply means that human beings can only listen to one musical composition at a given time, while another musical composition from the unattended year gets lost[6]. Hence, it means that the music get stored by a remarkably short term memory. In this method, one music type is introduced. It is necessary to note that this method considers that there is limited capacity to enable the processing of this information or the music.

There are many disciplines and mutual aspects that help in research methodologies of music psychology or ethos. Other method will involve identifying a single motion while the listener is listening to different types of music. In this case, a questionnaire is used to conduct an experiment. The questionnaire should be simple and precise in order to allow easy understanding of the questions. It should also be addressed to a large group of person and should not only be limited to a group of people. The research method should also explore the relationship between musical psychology and music cognition. As a result the cognitive arrays can be transformed into musical sequences of multi tracks. While constructing or developing the questionnaire, the researchers must consider the fact that music psychology methods are extremely difficult to implement[7]. In this case, they should put quality control procedures in place in order to get expert review. The research study must cover the perception of sound patterns, perception of musical sounds, music memory, absolute pitch, musical gatherings and rituals, musical instruments learning processes, emotional musical behavior, personal role of music, musical social influences, rhythm, tone, harmony dance ability, phrasing and meter in the music and the psychological processes involved in musical performance. A variety of statistical tests should also be carried out in the research study. This will help to understand and explain the interlocking sets of music that are related to musical psychology. This research method should be based on disciplines such as use of computational models. Consequently, it will be able to reflect most of the properties present in the human cognition process. In this case, a music task should be used in order to determine actual relations between the theories used and the statistical tests involved[8].

Results

Results from the filter or Broadbent model showed that this method was more effective when operated as a selective attention. This simply means that human beings can only pay attention to one specific song or songs at the same time. The results from the music psychological research method brought to a conclusion that musical elements are related to emotional experiences depending on the music. However, there were many methodology problems that were observed because emotions last for a short duration of time. Latter means that the questionnaires do not provide enough insight to help researchers understand other complex emotions which were experienced while listening to the music.

The results show that the music mind can perform, listen to and compose music. It also shows that the mind is linked to body language and responses from music. The resulting music therapy lowers the heart rate, anxiety, systolic and diastolic blood pressure. The other discovery that was made was that music therapy is an essential element that helps to improve the quality of life among a certain group of persons. Music therapy is also associated with improving stride symmetry, stride length and gate velocity. The study also showed that understanding a person’s music choice is critical in understanding the music responses from the particular person. Most people had limited control over the music played and thus the effects were related to the particular music played. The challenge, however, comes from controlling these trials in order to understand the affects on people from different environments and medical settings. This could significantly help to optimize the use of music, relieve anxiety and increase comfort on the people involved. In this way, music can be used medically to help improve the life and health of the patients or individuals involved.

Discussions

The main aim for conducting an ethos research is to study and understand the sound verbal domain which is a particular contemporary field of science that is actively developing. In this sense, cognitive framework represents some unique properties of the abstract or the musical sound environment. In this case, the sensory information or the frequency is ultimately transformed into a pitch. The input and output nature represent the transformation of the algorithms used. This research also explores the instantaneous biology of the human brain in order to present a functional base for the oriented neuropsychological work[9]. As the sound is produced from different sources the behavior can change or remain constant through time, however, using a limited number of cues can give conflicting evidence or reinforcement on the same. Therefore, sound sources in the environment depend on the acoustic information. In this case, the music or the arrangement of notes can profoundly affect the perpetual results of the same.

Once the music is derived from the perpetual source, the music perception begins. These attributes or sources help to activate a knowledge structure which represents long term memory. Music Psychology

Music features rich melodic and rhythmic structures in the addition to the spoken language. Language and music largely depend on the functions of the brain. As a result, the relationship between speech intonation’s perceptions and musical deafness or tone deafness are some of the behaviors that are illuminated in the neural foundations and cognitive domain[10]. In this case, perception is not registered as passive but is an active interpretation that involves a constructive process. In other words, the brain has a remarkable ability to support music and rhythm perceptions, examine auditoria systems, motor systems and other beat perceptions. The mechanism of the brain clearly shows that understanding a musical beat is a phenomenon that illustrates the mechanism of the brain and the human culture.

Temporal Dynamics of the Brain Activity

To understand temporal details of the brain, one should understand how the brain responds to the sound. A frequency tagging is a method that is used in the research to study the brain and how it evolves over time. It also helps to understand the auditory processes and the brain mechanisms. Stimulus affects the brain activity in a great way since the brain activity is largely related to the stimuli that become temporally correlated[11].

Music and Body Language

Music is a cultural form that has survived many generations from the historical times to present time. Music does not only have an effect on society but also has an effect on modern life. The body responds to music. Results and finding of numerous studies that have been carried out on this subject have proved that music is simply a unique thought that is related to the physical, spiritual and emotional aspects in the world. Therefore, a person’s mood can be easily changed by music. Music can also cause simultaneous physical responses in human beings. Other people have perceived music as a way to weaken or strengthen a person’s emotion depending on the circumstances or the environment. Music has many functions apart from relaxation. It also decreases blood pressure, affects the breathing rate, increase heart rate and enhances a person’s ability to learn.

Music Healthy Effects

Healthy effects of music are related to the power of music. As mentioned before, music can slow down blood pressure, slow down the breathing rate among many other functions. In this way, the person can live a healthy life. Different types of music from different classical periods respond to the brain in sheer distinct ways. The brain can respond to changes and repetition, mood contrast and pitch and patterns of rhythm. Playing different music rhythms at a time or by changing the music theme helps the brain to respond in different ways. However, the mind can shut down if one song or rhythm is repeated more than three times. The repetition can also cause the person to release emotions[12].

Conclusion

Therefore, it can be concluded that doctrine of ethos is directly related to how music affects brain. Doctrine of ethos pertain music in some ways. It can be clearly noted that the human brain can be affected by the music. The doctrine of ethos suggests that an ethical music has some benefits as well as harmful effects on the human brain. Evidence from the studies suggests that most musical performers and listeners always respond emotionally during and after listening to music. It is also clear that a human being can also listen to only one type of songs at a time. Moreover, the mind is linked to body languages and some responses from music. Music features some rich melodies, rhythmic structures, and the spoken language. Therefore, it is clear that language and music depends on the brain functions.