One day, whilst driving your little one to see their grandparents, you pop the radio on, only for your favourite song from your teenage years to start blasting through the car! After turning it down a little for the sake of the baby, you can’t help but sing along excitedly, bopping your head this way and that. And that’s when you notice your baby grinning from ear to ear, giggling as you belt out the words.

Before now, they haven’t been particularly interested in music, but for the remainder of the car journey you entertain them with song after song and they just can’t get enough. So that by the time you arrive, you can’t help but think, should I be playing more music to my baby? I’m sure I’ve heard it’s good for babies’ brains to play them music?

And you’d be right! This belief is known as the Mozart effect.

What is the Mozart effect?

The Mozart effect is essentially the belief that babies become smarter when exposed to music, classical or otherwise. This idea was originally based on old research that showed improvements in the IQ scores of university students who’d listened to classical music before taking the test. Now while this test was conducted a long time ago and didn’t have any particular relevance to babies, and we’d also like to stress that ‘smartness’ can’t really be measured, there’s been a great deal more research since that boasts several other benefits to exposing your baby to music.

So why should I expose my baby to music?

While the research is still ongoing and emerging, it does appear that exposing your baby to music offers lots of advantages. Now, neuroscientists have discovered actual changes in the auditory and prefrontal cortexes after a baby has listened to music, and these changes produce several brain and health-related benefits:

Research shows that the speech and melody in music can improve a child’s processing of speech.

Other examinations have also demonstrated that babies smile and communicate more when exposed to interactive music sessions.

Music has been related to several positive traits as your baby grows into toddlerhood, including being more helpful, empathetic, trusting, caring, and cooperative, and having a better capacity to share.

For premature infants, it’s also thought that playing music improves sleep, weight gain, feeding, bonding, and recovery from procedures.

And of course, listening to music can be a lot of fun for everyone involved!

So, now that we’ve explored the benefits, you’re likely itching to pop some music on or sing a lullaby to your baby, but before you go and have a dance with your little one, let’s take a look at a few ways in which you can introduce them to more music.

Is the Mozart effect real?

Is the Mozart effect real? Unii’s Baby Development Journey has the answer.