Psychology Resources Team [1] Psychology Resources Team

Music Therapy: Study Says Music Key for Non-Verbal Children and Children
with Speech and Language Delays

The concept for using music as a form of healing dates back to the times of Plato and Aristotle. The
ancient Greek Philosophers thought that music could serve as a therapeutic function for those
suffering from many different illnesses. Aristotle believed that if an ideal environment could be
achieved the healing process could be accelerated. Music was part of the ideal environment, and at
that time, there were healing shrines that housed hymn specialists as well as physicians (Gfeller, K.
E., 2002). The music therapy we are familiar with today began after World War I and II with the
treatment of veterans. Local musicians played for traumatized military patients and doctors and
nurses began to see positive results. Since then, there has been continuous research on the
effectiveness of music therapy.

An Introduction to Music Therapy: Theory and Practice, describes music therapy as an evidence-
based health profession that utilizes appropriate music as a tool to support many populations in
achieving holistic health goals. Interactive music therapy consists of numerous techniques that are
specifically designed to help children and adults with their specific health goals.

Some of the techniques used to integrate music therapy include the following:

 Making music with instruments

Psychology Resources Team! Click the link: https://wa.me/message/VOJHRDL42E56I1

 [2] Psychology Resources Team
 Movement exercises
 Repetitive music listening with headphones
 Music and imagery
 Songwriting
 Music combined with other creative arts
 Rhythmic entrainment therapy

What is Entrainment?

Take a glance at that last listing. Have you heard of the word entrainment before? Entrainment is
actually a physics term that describes when two systems or two objects start moving together with
the same movement. This requires less energy than moving in opposite directions. This phenomenon
Psychology Resources Team

occurs even if two objects are near each other and are not moving the same way. Over time, the
objects begin moving together. The same happens in our bodies to rhythm.

When you are jogging to music, you usually start running to the beat of the song. Each step is a beat
or a half beat and pretty soon your whole body is matching the rhythm. This also happens at concerts.
It’s almost impossible to not move your head, hips, feet, or hands to the songs. In our own bodies, the
lub dub of the heart has its own rhythmic beat and it controls the circulation in our bodies. It brings
the oxygenated blood to the brain which controls the Central Nervous System (CNS). When we are
excited or nervous, the heart rate and respirations increase. When we are tired or resting, our heart
rate goes down. Music creates life and expression.

Psychology Resources Team! Click the link: https://wa.me/message/VOJHRDL42E56I1

 [3] Psychology Resources Team
There are a multitude of universal traits that music carries. A few of these traits include the
following:

 Music encourages movement

 Music captivates and maintains attention
 Music helps release emotions
 People of all ability levels can participate
 Music taps into all regions of the brain
 Music facilitates learning

Why Entrainment Works

Psychology Resources Team

With music, our body systems naturally entrain with the available rhythm. When music input enters
into the auditory nerve and into the CNS, most of the information goes to the brain for processing,
but some input goes straight to the motor nerves in our spinal cord. This allows our muscles to start
moving without even thinking about it. It is the reason people tap their foot, dance to a rhythm or
walk in time to a beat without much effort. This entrainment process is also the reason why music
therapists can help someone increase their language skills, speech, balance and/or coordination. One
study shows entrainment music therapy is successful in cognitive rehabilitation, especially for speech
and language rehabilitation and skill building.

How Music Therapy Cultivates Speech and Language

Over the years, the therapeutic, medical and educational communities have come to understand the
power of music. Music has both sound and rhythmic elements that communicate to the human body.
We can begin to learn another language when we tap into the entrainment power music has. In The
Well Balanced Child, written by Sally Goddard Blythe, she portrays music as the child’s second
language. She defines the child’s first language as movement, and goes onto say movement moves
into language when the baby is discovering his own movements and the environment. Before the
child can speak words there is cooing and babbling. Babbling includes tone, pitch and cadence.
Babies will imitate the rhythm of adult speech and adult sounds. This is all building a symphony of
sounds so their vocabulary will be constructed when ready.

Did you know that listening to or singing along with music uses the same neural circuits as
expressing speech? Music, the rhythm, the beat, the cadence, even the lyrics share neural circuits
used for language. Therapists can use this ability to help a child who struggles with language and
speech skills to communicate. Children with developmental disabilities or those who have autism and
other obstacles many times struggle with communication and interpersonal skills. Just as music

Psychology Resources Team! Click the link: https://wa.me/message/VOJHRDL42E56I1

 [4] Psychology Resources Team
therapy helps with interpersonal interaction and emotions, it can also assist with communication
skills.
Psychology Resources Team

Music therapy has helped many kids with speech, language, auditory, balance, coordination and
emotional grounding. Music combined with movement often stabilizes and opens the brain for higher
learning. Concepts that are difficult for many children at first, begin to make sense as music and
movement organize the brain by regulating its lower levels (balance, coordination, vestibular,
auditory) to open the mind for higher learning concepts that affect the higher working portions of the
brain (problem solving, critical thinking, communication, speech, language, reading, writing and
math). If you haven’t tried music therapy yet with your child’s Occupational Therapy or movement
therapy, ask questions and inquire if this could be an option for your child. Music therapy may be
another piece to improving your child’s academics.

Source: Google

To get such exclusive psychology resources

Join our WhatsApp group: https://wa.me/message/VOJHRDL42E56I1

Psychology Resources Team! Click the link: https://wa.me/message/VOJHRDL42E56I1