Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

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Open Access Thesis

Keywords

Aggressiveness in children; Environmental music--Psychological aspects; Music--Psychological aspects; Academic theses;

Abstract

Previous research has suggested that background music influences children's classroom behaviors. However, the results of research to date are conflicting on the effects of hard rock background music on children's behavior. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to examine the differential effects of hard rock and easy listening music on preschoolers' aggressive behaviors during center time (e.g., during free play at the water table, art, blocks, and reading centers). Four classrooms with a combined total of 74 students (31 boys and 43 girls) participated in the study. During the 55-day study, we recorded the frequency of children's aggressive behaviors during a silent baseline condition and two music conditions, hard rock and easy listening. It was hypothesized that the frequency of aggressive behaviors would increase from baseline during the hard rock music condition and decrease from baseline during the easy listening music condition. Results indicated that the frequency of aggressive behaviors increased from baseline during the hard rock condition (9% baseline versus 15% hard rock) but did not decrease much from baseline during the easy listening condition (9% baseline versus 7% easy listening). Implications for early childhood education are discussed along with limitations of the study and directions for future research.

Year of Submission

2009

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

Department of Psychology

First Advisor

Carolyn Hildebrandt

Second Advisor

Seth Brown

Third Advisor

Sunde Nesbit

Comments

If you are the rightful copyright holder of this thesis and wish to have it removed from the Open Access Collection, please submit a request to scholarworks@uni.edu and include clear identification of the work, preferably with URL.

Date Original

2009

Object Description

1 PDF file (56 leaves)

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

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