WAAM’s Music Impact Research Center (MIRC) funds, researches, aggregates, and disseminates data measuring music’s influence through rigorous, scientific means. 

 

We have formed a community of domain experts to develop and guide priorities. The team is responsible for curating leading third-party research, as well as producing original content to illustrate and substantiate the tangible link between music and key success metrics. Our analysis is publicly available; it is also shared with our grantees and factors into the evaluation of program delivery. 

 

Interested in the minds behind this effort? Meet our research team!

FEATURED CASE STUDY

Metrics Linking Guitars Over Guns to Broader Social Emotional Learning (SEL)

Improving Capacities and Experiences

The We Are All Music Foundation, in partnership with Hello Insight, recently undertook a case study of one of our Power of Music Grantees – Guitars Over Guns – to showcase how their music mentoring program has helped bring about some striking improvements across key metrics showing progress towards Social and Emotional Learning (SEL).

Photo credit: Isaac Rodriguez

For CORE SEL, 58% of participants showed improvement in this umbrella category.

Core SEL is further broken down into the follow sub-categories:

Contribution

Measures a young person’s desire to engage with and contribute to family, community, and society

of participants reported improvement

Self-Management

Measures the ability of a young person to regulate their emotions and behavior, take positive risks, and persist through life’s challenges

of participants reported improvement

Positive Identity

Measures a young person's internal sense of who they are and confidence to explore the multiple facets of their identities

of participants reported improvement

Academic Self-Efficacy

Measures a young person's motivation and perceived mastery over their own learning, school performance, and potential to attain academic success

of participants reported improvement

Social Skills

Measures the ability of a young person to take others’ perspectives into account, and to develop a sense of caring and empathy

of participants reported improvement

WELCOME TO THE MUSIC IMPACT RESEARCH CENTER

FEATURED ARTICLES

Dopamine Modulates The Reward Experiences Elicited By Music

Understanding how the brain translates a structured sequence of sounds, such as music, into a pleasant and rewarding experience is a fascinating question which may be crucial to better understand the processing of abstract rewards in humans. Previous neuroimaging findings point to a challenging role of the dopaminergic system in music-evoked pleasure.
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Establishing Identity: LGBT Studies & Music Education – Select Conference Proceedings

This paywall article summarizes the presentations given at the Establishing Identity Conference at the University of Illinois from May 23-26, 2010. The conference was jointly organized by the University of Maryland and the University of Illinois. It is included in the Spring, 2011 Edition of the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education. AUTHOR SUMMARY: Gregory F. DeNordo, Allen R.
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How Do Music Activities Affect Health and Well-Being? A Scoping Review of Studies Examining Psychosocial Mechanisms

This scoping review analyzed research about how music activities may affect participants’ health and well-being. Primary outcomes were measures of health (including symptoms and health behaviors) and well-being. Secondary measures included a range of psychosocial processes such as arousal, mood, social connection, physical activation or relaxation, cognitive functions, and identity.
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Introducing Social Emotional Learning to Music Education Professional Development

There are more knowledge bases, skills, and dispositions that teachers need to have than can be covered in undergraduate music teacher education. One knowledge base that music teachers could benefit from, which is rarely covered in preservice teacher education, is social emotional learning (SEL) and techniques to implement it in their classrooms. Professional development (PD) can help provide career-long growth.
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