Music has been an integral part of my life. I began playing piano when I was two years old and percussion in fourth grade. As I progressed through elementary and middle school, I also developed a deep passion for math. When it came time to choose a research topic for the Al Kalfus Long Island Math Fair in eighth grade, I combined these two passions and investigated the connections between math and music theory. I became fascinated by this connection and continued to research different subtopics of math and music for each subsequent year of the Math Fair, receiving multiple gold medals … In high school, I began to read academic journal articles, both in my research class and on my own time, about music’s benefits on society, and I also grew interested in the intersection of psychology and music. I found it intriguing how music’s effects can be so widespread – from improving cognition to treating anxiety and depression. I wanted to perform my own independent research project that would enhance the developments in this field. However, after reading many articles as well as more popular literature on the subject, I noticed a certain rampant inaccuracy regarding musical intervals and emotion that has been compounded over time. (Specifically, many authors have asserted that music’s major-minor dichotomy applies to keys, chords, and intervals. However, the dichotomy is not applicable on the intervallic level.) So, I decided to design a survey that would test this widespread inaccuracy among the literature. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, 180 adults from the general population responded to my survey, which was presented online and included embedded audio samples. I completed research both at home and at school.

The inspiration for this project really comes from my undying love of music, and my inkling for finding scientific explanations for everything. My volunteering experiences especially inspired how I undertook this project. I’ve been volunteering as a music therapist in places like our local science museum as well as schools in India using my drumming. I’ve noticed that drums are very effective at reducing stress, improving motor skills, and focus-related tasks for children in particular, yet when it comes to professional auditory therapy, drums are neglected in favor of synthesized compositions like binaural beats. As a result, auditory therapy can be difficult for some children especially, to use effectively, as the monotony of some therapy tactics could actually be irritants and end up having adverse effects. Thus, my research project attempts to make auditory therapy more universal and accessible for listeners of all kind, by adding elements of music and rhythm to it. I wanted to find out, however, if there is a scientific basis of adding musical percussion to a binaural beat, in order to make this method of auditory therapy more musical. This would allow me to use the same percussion that I have seen to work as music therapy, and introduce it into binaural beats to make this type of auditory therapy more accessible, appropriate, and enjoyable to listen to for many people, especially those with Autism or ADHD. In order for me to perform this research, Music Technology Professor Daniel Walzer from UMass Lowell graciously offered his help as a mentor. He suggested numerous tweaks and changes that I made to my research plan, including the recording setup, how I transferred the audio to my computer, which kinds of spectrograms and audio analysis tools to use, and even how to record two different drums to achieve optimal recordings. Overall, however, I didn’t use any labs or professional-level equipment to perform this project, and, for the most part, this project was done entirely at home … If I had to summarize this project and my experiences during it in just a few words, it would go something like this. Binaural beats are tools used in music and auditory therapy to improve memory and sharpen focus and motor skills. They involve playing two different tones into each ear so that the brain perceives a third tone with a pulsing effect and creates its own brainwaves. Since percussion is often used in music therapy, but rarely in binaural beats, I want to find if there is a scientific conclusion to be made about adding a percussive backbeat to binaural beats. I recorded and created percussion-based binaural beats using computer software, and I wrote a computer simulation software that takes into account frequency ranges, pitches, and pulsing effects of drumming among other factors to determine how efficient a certain binaural beat is in eliciting brainwaves. I found that whenever certain aspects of a percussion-based backbeat were optimized, they were 4% more efficient than regular binaural beats. I’d like to continue this research by performing brainwave analysis on humans in the future. This research could increase the accessibility of music therapy compared to monotonous binaural beats, as rhythmic compositions involving a binaural beat can increase therapeutic effects and appeal to more listeners in the general public, especially those with Autism or ADHD.