Music and Its Relationship to Dreams and the Self

There has been little scientific investigation of music and its psychological and physiological effects on the listener. This paper will examine music as a powerful stimulus, exploring its effects from several different perspectives including a comparison of music and the dream state which both share many similar qualities. A theoretical focus on the phenomenological aspects of music, auditory experience, psychoanalytic thought, and music's relationship to dreams will be followed by an empirical overview of the psychological and physiological effects of music. Rapid eye movement (REM), hemispheric laterahzation, and their relevance to both music and dreams will also be examined. The latter half of this paper is devoted to an exploration of music and dreams from a self psychological perspective. The concept of the self, self objects,

and the function of dreams will be reviewed within this model. Music will be examined utilizing the experience of matching and twinship selfobjects. Finally, music and dreams will be seen as unique experiences of the self and serving similar intrapsychic functions, vital to the maintenance and integration of the self system.