Mental Illness & Music – A Study

Renee Marques

Biography

Renee Marques is a 4th year ProCom student passionate about all things creative, with special interest in the entertainment (and especially the music) industry. Through her time at Ryerson, she has honed her skills in being a multifaceted communicator and being able to convey messages visually, textually, sonically, or through a combination of the three. She is extremely comfortable in many editing softwares and both enjoys ands excels in doing any work where she is able to express herself.

Moving forward, Renee hopes to pursue a master’s degree in communication to take these skills to the next level and gain more of the practical hands-on experience she desires. After that, her dream is to be a part of the communication or social media team for a record label or any other content creation agency.

Research Summary

My research aimed to examine the relationship between mental illness and music. I have noticed that many of the people that I know who are diagnosed with mental illnesses seem to have a fondness for music, myself included. Therefore, my research project was carried out on the premise that the two are intrinsically linked.

Many studies of a similar nature have been done in the past, however they mainly focused on the surface level of if music is beneficial to those with mental illness in general. My research went more into detail and attempted to pinpoint to see if there are any specific genres mentally ill people are more drawn to, and the reasons why they like them. I also wanted to see how music helps them to deal with their conditions and the benefits it provides them with. To do so, a survey of 6 questions was developed, and interviews were carried out with a few individuals who opted for them. These questions focused on the respondents’ music tastes as well as how much they regularly engage with music.

Tags

music; mental health; mental illness; entertainment

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