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Bronwyn Tarr

Bio: Bronwyn Tarr is an academic researcher from University of Oxford. The author has contributed to research in topics: Dance & Musicality. The author has an hindex of 7, co-authored 13 publications receiving 754 citations.

Papers
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Evidence supporting self-other merging as a consequence of inter-personal synchrony, and the release of endorphins during exertive rhythmic activities including musical interaction are reviewed.
Abstract: It has been suggested that a key function of music during its development and spread amongst human populations was its capacity to create and strengthen social bonds amongst interacting group members. However, the mechanisms by which this occurs have not been fully discussed. In this paper we review evidence supporting two thus far independently investigated mechanisms for this social bonding effect: self-other merging as a consequence of inter-personal synchrony, and the release of endorphins during exertive rhythmic activities including musical interaction. In general, self-other merging has been experimentally investigated using dyads, which provide limited insight into large-scale musical activities. Given that music can provide an external rhythmic framework that facilitates synchrony, explanations of social bonding during group musical activities should include reference to endorphins, which are released during synchronised exertive movements. Endorphins (and the Endogenous Opioid System (EOS) in general) are involved in social bonding across primate species, and are associated with a number of human social behaviours (e.g. laughter, synchronised sports), as well as musical activities (e.g. singing and dancing). Furthermore, passively listening to music engages the EOS, so here we suggest that both self-other merging and the EOS are important in the social bonding effects of music. In order to investigate possible interactions between these two mechanisms, future experiments should recreate ecologically valid examples of musical activities.

294 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Both exertion and synchrony demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain threshold (a proxy for endorphin activation) and in-group bonding, which suggests that dance which involves both exertive and synchronized movement may be an effective group bonding activity.
Abstract: Group dancing is a ubiquitous human activity that involves exertive synchronized movement to music. It is hypothesized to play a role in social bonding, potentially via the release of endorphins, which are analgesic and reward-inducing, and have been implicated in primate social bonding. We used a 2 × 2 experimental design to examine effects of exertion and synchrony on bonding. Both demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain threshold (a proxy for endorphin activation) and in-group bonding. This suggests that dance which involves both exertive and synchronized movement may be an effective group bonding activity.

235 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is suggested that dance encourages social bonding amongst co-actors by stimulating the production of endorphins, but may not make people more altruistic.

183 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The music and social bonding (MSB) hypothesis provides the most comprehensive theory to date of the biological and cultural evolution of music.
Abstract: Why do humans make music? Theories of the evolution of musicality have focused mainly on the value of music for specific adaptive contexts such as mate selection, parental care, coalition signaling, and group cohesion. Synthesizing and extending previous proposals, we argue that social bonding is an overarching function that unifies all of these theories, and that musicality enabled social bonding at larger scales than grooming and other bonding mechanisms available in ancestral primate societies. We combine cross-disciplinary evidence from archeology, anthropology, biology, musicology, psychology, and neuroscience into a unified framework that accounts for the biological and cultural evolution of music. We argue that the evolution of musicality involves gene-culture coevolution, through which proto-musical behaviors that initially arose and spread as cultural inventions had feedback effects on biological evolution because of their impact on social bonding. We emphasize the deep links between production, perception, prediction, and social reward arising from repetition, synchronization, and harmonization of rhythms and pitches, and summarize empirical evidence for these links at the levels of brain networks, physiological mechanisms, and behaviors across cultures and across species. Finally, we address potential criticisms and make testable predictions for future research, including neurobiological bases of musicality and relationships between human music, language, animal song, and other domains. The music and social bonding hypothesis provides the most comprehensive theory to date of the biological and cultural evolution of music.

143 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Oct 2016-Ethology
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used European Research Council Advanced Investigator Grant No. 295663 (ARIGA) to support RD's work in the field of bioinformatics.
Abstract: This work was funded by European Research Council Advanced Investigator Grant No. 295663 awarded to RD.

113 citations


Cited by
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01 Feb 1980-Nature

1,368 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is argued that singing may have evolved to quickly bond large human groups of relative strangers, potentially through encouraging willingness to coordinate by enhancing positive affect, and represents the first evidence for an ‘ice-breaker effect' of singing in promoting fast cohesion between unfamiliar individuals.
Abstract: It has been proposed that singing evolved to facilitate social cohesion. However, it remains unclear whether bonding arises out of properties intrinsic to singing or whether any social engagement can have a similar effect. Furthermore, previous research has used one-off singing sessions without exploring the emergence of social bonding over time. In this semi-naturalistic study, we followed newly formed singing and non-singing (crafts or creative writing) adult education classes over seven months. Participants rated their closeness to their group and their affect, and were given a proxy measure of endorphin release, before and after their class, at three timepoints (months 1, 3 and 7). We show that although singers and non-singers felt equally connected by timepoint 3, singers experienced much faster bonding: singers demonstrated a significantly greater increase in closeness at timepoint 1, but the more gradual increase shown by non-singers caught up over time. This represents the first evidence for an 'ice-breaker effect' of singing in promoting fast cohesion between unfamiliar individuals, which bypasses the need for personal knowledge of group members gained through prolonged interaction. We argue that singing may have evolved to quickly bond large human groups of relative strangers, potentially through encouraging willingness to coordinate by enhancing positive affect.

253 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Both exertion and synchrony demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain threshold (a proxy for endorphin activation) and in-group bonding, which suggests that dance which involves both exertive and synchronized movement may be an effective group bonding activity.
Abstract: Group dancing is a ubiquitous human activity that involves exertive synchronized movement to music. It is hypothesized to play a role in social bonding, potentially via the release of endorphins, which are analgesic and reward-inducing, and have been implicated in primate social bonding. We used a 2 × 2 experimental design to examine effects of exertion and synchrony on bonding. Both demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain threshold (a proxy for endorphin activation) and in-group bonding. This suggests that dance which involves both exertive and synchronized movement may be an effective group bonding activity.

235 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This work provides a comprehensive overview of the topic and proposes a theoretical framework of how neuronal entrainment dynamically structures information from incoming neuronal, bodily and environmental sources.

217 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors meta-analytically investigated the strength of synchrony on four dimensions of response: prosocial behavior, perceived social bonding, social cognition, and positive affect.

209 citations