Amazing Benefits of Listening to Music

If you love listening to music, you’re good company. 【小题1】

★Music makes you happier.

When you listen to music, your brain produces a special matter. It biologically (生物学上) causes listeners to feel emotions like happiness, excitement, and joy. So next time you need an emotional increase, listen to your favorite tunes for 15 minutes.

★【小题2】

Listening to music you enjoy reduces levels of the stress in your body. This is an important finding since stress causes many illnesses. To stay calm and healthy during a stressful day, turn on the radio.

★Music helps you sleep better.

A study showed that students listening to classical music for 45 minutes slept better than students who did nothing. If you’re having trouble sleeping, try listening to a little Bach or Mozart before bedtime.

★Music helps you eat less.

【小题3】If you’re looking for ways to reduce your appetite (食欲), try dimming the lights and listening to soft music next time you sit down for a meal.

★Music strengthens learning and memory.

Researchers discovered that music can help you learn and recall information better. 【小题4】 Memorize these results. You now have a strategy to study more effectively for your next test.

★Music raises IQ and school performance.

Research shows that taking music lessons predicts higher school performance and IQ in young children. 【小题5】

   A new study says that the faces on Lego minifigures have become less happy and more often mad or sad. The study was designed to find out if the Lego characters have become grumpier over the years.

Christoph Bartneck works at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. He loves Lego and even worked for the company in the 1990s. He worked with another researcher on the project. They looked at all of the 6,000 figures made between 1975 and 2010. They made a note of each figure’s facial expression: happy, grumpy, afraid, surprised or satL They discovered that while in 1980, all of the figures were described as “smiley”, and that by 1990, only about 80 per cent of them had been “smiley” . And by 2010, just 50 per cent of the figures had had a smile on their little plastic faces.

The researchers are wondering how the increasingly sad, angry and unhappy faces on the Lego figures will affect the children who play with them. “Children’s toys can have an important influence on children,” said Bartneck on the university’s website. While Lego hasn’t issued an official response to the study, Bartneck said he thought the reason why Lego was producing angrier-faced characters was that children wanted them. He said it was likely that people wanted Lego characters to have different expressions, rather than just being sunny all the time. He said most of the unhappy faces were on characters based on a specific theme such as Harry Potter or pirates (海盗).

Bartneck will present his findings at the International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction in Sapporo.

   Cellphones, tablets, and computers are keeping children and teenagers awake at night-even when they' re not in use, according to new research. A study published on Monday in JAMA Pediatrics says that media devices are causing kids to sleep less and reducing the quality of sleep that they get. This leads to trouble of staying awake the next day.

Researchers analyzed hundreds of studies of children and teens aged 6-19. The scientists found a strong and consistent association between the use of technology at bedtime and poor sleeping. The reason is not just that kids are staying up too late with their devices. Using a computer can overstimulate the mind and emotions, the researchers say. A smartphone or tablet also gives off a light that affects the body's natural timing. These factors contribute to poor quality sleep. And many kids could be at risk. According to the study,72% of all children and 89% of adolescents have at least one device in their sleep environment. Most of these devices are used near bedtime.

"The harmful association between screen-based devices and kids' sleep is a major public health concern," the study concludes. In their conclusion, the researchers urge parents to understand the damaging influence of device use before sleep.