Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Considering his claim to be able to compose full symphonies in his head, Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is rightly considered a musical genius and virtuoso. But that doesn’t mean listening to him will make your kid any smarter.[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2M2TKnWpm_s]
Researchers at Vienna University’s Faculty of Psychology say you can take the earphones playing Symphony No. 25 in G Minor off of Junior’s head: new evidence shows it won’t get him into preschool pre-calc any easier than anything else you might try. Unfortunately for parents who piled up Mozart CDs in the baby’s bedroom and even listened to the music during pregnancy, Mozart won’t make your child smarter than listening Nikki Minaj, Justin Bieber or Ke$ha would.
This latest research was partly in response to a 1993 report in the journal Science that cited a University of California study which found that 36 students listening to the composer’s 1781 work, Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major, performed better in reasoning tests than adolescents who listened to other music or none at all. But after Vienna University researchers examined 3,000 cases from 40 worldwide studies, the scientists determined the ‘Mozart Effect’ is a Mozart Myth.
“I recommend listening to Mozart to everyone,” said the study’s lead author, Jakob Pietschnig, “But it will not meet expectations of boosting cognitive abilities.”
Actually, this isn’t the first time anyone called a B-Flat pishtaw to the Mozart Effect. Psychologist Scott E. Lilienfield lists the so-called phenomenon as sixth in his 2009 book 50 Great Myths of Popular Psychology.