Brain activity can predict what music we like, new study finds

TORONTO – A new study suggests brain activity can be used to accurately guess what music people enjoy enough to buy.

The study, published in the journal Science, found that an area of the brain called the nucleus accumbens drives people’s responses to music they’ve never heard before.

Researchers set up a mock environment resembling iTunes and measured activity in the nucleus accumbens as people browsed through unfamiliar songs.

Study participants could buy music with their own money at any one of four price points.

Researchers found the amount of activity in the nucleus accumbens allowed them to accurately predict which songs the subjects would download and how much money they were willing to spend.

But they say overall enjoyment of music is a more complex phenomenon involving many different regions of the brain.