Can Music Help Prevent Cognitive Decline? With Professor Joanne Ryan

Can listening to music help protect your brain as you age?

In this episode of Causes or Cures, Dr. Eeks talks with Professor Joanne Ryan about her research on music, dementia risk, cognitive decline, and healthy aging.

Drawing on data from thousands of older adults participating in the ASPREE Longitudinal Study of Older Persons (ALSOP), Professor Ryan discusses findings suggesting that frequent music engagement—including listening to music and playing a musical instrument—was associated with a lower risk of dementia and better cognitive outcomes over time.

The conversation explores:

• Whether listening to music can help reduce dementia risk
• How playing a musical instrument may affect brain health
• Proposed biological and cognitive mechanisms behind music's effects on the brain
• Music, memory, and why some people with dementia can still remember and perform music
• Whether certain types of music may be more beneficial than others
• The limitations of observational research and what questions still remain unanswered

If you've ever wondered whether your favorite playlist is doing more than entertaining you, this episode explores what the science currently says about music, memory, cognition, and the aging brain.

About Professor Joanne Ryan

Professor Joanne Ryan is a Principal Research Fellow and leader of the Biological Neuropsychiatry and Dementia research team at Monash University in Australia. Her research focuses on understanding the causes, prevention, and early detection of neuropsychiatric disorders, particularly dementia and depression.

Her team investigates biological, lifestyle, and environmental risk factors that influence brain health and works to identify preventive strategies that may reduce the incidence of dementia and cognitive decline. The group also studies biomarkers that may improve the timing and accuracy of diagnosis and help evaluate the effectiveness of interventions. 

Professor Ryan has published extensively on aging, cognition, dementia risk factors, mental health, and preventive approaches to healthy brain aging.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Causes or Cures Podcast, your gateway to understanding health and groundbreaking medical research in a fun and easy to understand way. With Dr. Eats as your host, join us as we sit down with the world's leading doctors and scientists to unravel the mysteries of health. From practical tips on well-being to the latest breakthroughs in medical research, we cover it all. Don't forget to subscribe. Now, let's ignite our curiosity and together dive into today's episode.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Hello everybody, and welcome to this episode of Causes or Cures. I'm Dr. Ekes, your host, and thanks for joining in. So, can your Spotify playlist help protect your brain? Or however you listen to music, right? Today I'm chatting with Professor Joanne Ryan from Minash University about her fascinating research on music, dementia risk, cognitive decline, and healthy aging, right? We discussed whether listening to music or playing an instrument might help keep the brain healthier as we age, the possible biological mechanisms behind these effects, and what her research found when she followed older adults over time. Because if listening to music could help reduce dementia risk, you guys, that's probably one of the most enjoyable public health interventions I've come across, um, and one that anyone can do. Uh, or biohack, if you want to call it that, since that word is trending all the time. All right, let's connect to Professor Ryan and hear what she has to say. All right, everyone, we are connecting with Dr. Joanne Ryan, and we're going to talk about music and the brain, a topic I love. But first, Dr. Ryan, thank you so much for joining in. And I thought we could start out by you telling our listeners a little bit about yourself and what you do.

SPEAKER_03 2:03

Yeah, well, thank you very much for having me on. Um, I'm really excited to speak to you today. So I'm a professor of epidemiology. My area of interest is really in uh dementia prevention. And I work at Monash University in which is in Melbourne, in Australia.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

So across the globe. And I'm so glad because sometimes when I reach out to professors in like other countries, it's always like, okay, what's the time difference? And then I have to put it Australia is a big one, though. I always have to remember, like it's but what time is it over there now? So it's 7 30 in the morning. Oh, that's early. Okay, okay, wow. Well, I appreciate you getting up early to do this then. Thank you. Unless you get up.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

I find with the US, because you have so many different time zones that even coordinating with different people in the US can be challenging.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Yeah, it's so true. It is so true. All right, so you do work on dementia, which obviously lots of people are, you know, interested in right now and how to prevent it. It's sounds scary to a lot of people, but how did you get, you know, interested in this topic? Was this something you've always wanted to study?

SPEAKER_03 3:15

Yeah, so I've always been interested in the brain and the way the brain functions. And I have had personal experience um with older relatives who developed dementia. But this was a number of years ago at a time when people didn't really talk about it. So I was quite young at the time, it was my great-grandmother, and it was a very different relationship that we had. People weren't open about what dementia was, and it was more just that I had this relationship with my great-grandmother, and then we seemed to have this distance between us, and I could no longer communicate with her as I did before. And so at the time I found that really challenging and difficult to understand. And I didn't have a lot of people around me who were able to explain that in simple terms. So I think because of that, it really triggered an interest in understanding the brain. And from that, I really moved into the area of dementia. Originally, my interest was both in late-life depression and dementia, which are two um conditions which are often comorbid. So often people will have both depression and dementia. Often in people with uh depression, it can be hard to diagnose dementia. So it's um a bit of a it can be challenging to determine in people who have depression whether it's dementia as well, or whether it's just depression that's causing problems with their thinking and memory.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

Yeah, no, no, absolutely. And I know you mean I can relate to that feeling you just described, how like you can't really connect to the person anymore. And that's a tough feeling. It's it's really it's like heartbreaking, you know?

SPEAKER_03 5:05

Yeah, and over the years I've spoken to more and more people and have a much better understanding, obviously, of it now than I did before. Um, but it is really challenging. It's really challenging for the family, um, the children, the spouses, um, not only in terms of what we recognize as caregiver burden, but also just in terms of of losing the person that you that you once knew. They're still there physically, but you lose so much of them and the person that they were. So it can be very challenging.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Through your research, do you think though that they still like they know, maybe not know who you are, but is there still like a connection there, you think? I don't know what I'm asking. Maybe you know what I'm asking.

SPEAKER_03 5:52

Yeah, I I think it certainly and it varies over time.

unknown 5:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:57

So it's not just like an all or nothing. Um, and I think I mean music is one of the things that people have said can really trigger this connection again. Um, so it's and that's yeah, one of the areas that I was interested in.

SPEAKER_01 6:14

So that was my next question because we're talking about music, and I think music is so powerful, and I get so excited when it's connected to health and kind of unlocking the powers of music. But how how did you get interested in music related to brain health?

SPEAKER_03 6:31

Yeah, so because of my interest in brain health, um, and we have a lot of people that are working really hard at trying to identify cures for for Alzheimer's disease, which is the most common cause for dementia, but also other causes of dementia. So there's a lot of really important research on that topic, trying to understand how we can stop this disease occurring and how we can cure it. But at the moment, um, there is no cure. So there are new um treatments which have come out which have been shown to be effective somewhat in slowing uh progression of the disease when they're administered early on, um when someone first starts showing signs of dementia, but they're not for everyone, uh, they're not widely available, they're costly, and they don't actually stop the disease, they can just slow the progress. So dementia prevention is really an important aspect. Um, so can we can we identify ways in which we can stop the disease process occurring to begin with? That's one aspect. But the other aspect is even for people who have some evidence of the disease in their brain, can we actually delay, really push back the onset of cognitive um decline and symptoms that present as dementia? So if we can do that, even if we could push back the onset of severe cognitive decline for five, ten years, I mean, that would have a huge impact.

SPEAKER_02 8:04

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 8:05

So I was really interested in the different um approaches that have been explored to try and prevent dementia. And there's been a lot of work that's been done on things like um health conditions. So we know treating various health conditions is important. Uh, we know things like education in early life is important, uh, we know uh depression, which I mentioned earlier. So we know about a lot of factors, um, but there's likely to be other factors that we just haven't explored in detail. So, and I was interested in those. What we refer to as um modifiable or what people could can do, the advice that we can give to people now to say, well, how about you try engaging in these types of activities? And that could actually show some benefit.

SPEAKER_01 8:58

All right, so I want to hear more about theories as to why music might help, but maybe talk a little bit if you can give a summary, plain language summary overview of the study that you did, just so our listeners have an idea, and then we can talk about results and then get into like why, you know, did could this happen?

SPEAKER_03 9:19

Okay, so what we did in this study was really leverage what started off as a clinical trial. So this cohort of uh over 19,000 individuals were recruited as part of a clinical trial to see whether low-dose aspirin could be beneficial for older individuals. So, whether it could delay the onset of things like uh dementia, physical disability, and whether it could prolong survival. So that was the original purpose of the trial. It was a trial that was undertaken in both the US and in Australia, and we recruited people who were predominantly um 70 years and over and were in relatively good health. So the trial itself ran for five years and we actually showed no benefit of aspirin, no, no real adverse effects, but really no effect of low-dose aspirin. But as part of that study, um, we collected a lot of additional, really comprehensive information on this cohort. So we thought we've got this trial running of older individuals. We were very interested in other aspects. So maybe we would see an effect of aspirin, maybe we wouldn't see an effect, but we know that there are a lot of other really important aspects that we should be considering. So we collected quite detailed uh social information and also things like medical histories as well. But as part of the social information that we collected, we were interested in aspects which could show benefit in preventing dementia, just based on existing literature. And so some of those things were so engagement in cognitive stimulating activities like crosswords or puzzles, um, but also an important aspect was music. So whether people who said that they regularly listened to music or that they regularly played a musical instrument. So we gathered that information uh very early on in the study, and then we followed these individuals over five years for the trial, and then we continued to follow them. So we got additional funding to enable us to follow them out for over 10 years. So we have this large cohort, initially all more than 70, and then they were getting into their 80s, and so we're able to um look at who developed dementia over that time period. Um, we were able to look at changes in their cognitive function over that time period, and then look back at whether they said that they were regular engaging in music or listening to music.

SPEAKER_01 11:55

Okay, so tell talk about some of the results that you found. So that our listeners were so interesting.

SPEAKER_03 12:02

Yeah. So what we found were that the people who said that they every day they were listening to music, that music was really just a part of their daily lives, that over that 10-year period um there were fewer individuals who developed dementia compared to the groups who would just listen to it occasionally or sometimes or never. Um, we also found that over that period we had better uh memory and other and processing speed, so another area of cognitive function. So, how quickly you can receive information and really process and understand that information. So, in the group who listened to music, they had better performance on those cognitive tasks over that time period as well.

SPEAKER_01 12:49

And you did you you also looked at if people played an instrument?

SPEAKER_03 12:53

Yeah, so so we'd also ask them about whether they um played instruments, and over that time period we saw a similar effect. Um, so well, a similar association. So people who were playing music, musical instruments regular. It wasn't every day because we didn't have as many that were engaging every day, but people who played instruments regularly, they also had a reduced risk of dementia over that time period.

SPEAKER_01 13:20

That's I mean, that's impressive. And was the common did you look at like, okay, if you I know there's probably less people who play an instrument, you know, but if like was it the comp the combination strongest, or you didn't see that? There wasn't enough people to see that? Like if you listen to it.

SPEAKER_03 13:35

Yeah, so we yeah. We did look at it and it was really no no better. So um, it wasn't an additive benefit of of both listening and playing a musical instrument. It seemed to be either was was beneficial for you.

SPEAKER_01 13:53

Okay. And I have to ask, do you think the type of music matters? Like, or I don't know if your survey asked about that. And the only reason I'm asking, because like when I leave, for example, I have no idea where I heard this. I just it was probably some study. I have no idea where who funded it, but in my head, I had the I had heard it's stuck in my brain that if like my dog listens to reggae music, when I leave the house, he won't have as much anxiety. So I have not fact-checked this, but when the dog sitter came in the one day, I was like, just so you know, like I play reggae music because I read somewhere. She's like, Oh, I heard that too. And I'm like, okay, so maybe this is like a legit study that one day I'll actually like look and see if there's actually a study out there. So when I was reading your study, the first now, mind you, when I play any music like lullabies or right, he seems to do the same thing, which is just to lie there and relax. I haven't tried like heavy metal, obviously, but when I heard your study, I was thinking, does the type of music matter?

SPEAKER_03 14:56

Yeah, it's a great question. Um, and yeah, I've got a few thoughts around that. So one, we didn't get, we didn't collect that information. It it would have been challenging, we thought about collecting it, but it's it's it's challenging to to say to somebody, how often do you listen to this type of music and this type of music and how many hours or how many minutes? Um, these are older, older individuals. And so generally with the questionnaires, we try and keep them um as simple as possible because the more complex there are, the more likely we're going to have data errors. So that's one aspect. Um, the second aspect is that there has exist in literature that suggests that certain types of music can be, so for example, classical music. There have been studies that have shown that classical music can be beneficial to help you concentrate and focus. So I think for for quite a while, um, at least in Australia, that's that's something that's that people know about. And university students who are trying to study for exams, for example, may put classical music on in the background because they help it, they find that it helps them them concentrate.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

Yeah, more than for the mind. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:19

Yeah. I think though a really important aspect is what music you relate to and you take pleasure from.

SPEAKER_01 16:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

So I think um for your dog, for example, heavy metal music might not be his taste. We don't know. You don't know. He hasn't been exposed.

SPEAKER_01 16:43

Yeah. But you're right. Oh, okay. So that makes sense, like personal preference. And obviously, like that's what probably what someone is listening to regularly is something that they like. If they're listening to something they don't like, that would be a little weird. So uh maybe there's someone out there like that, an outlier who listens to music they don't like. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 17:04

Um, yeah, some sort of or are forced to because their partner likes that music.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

There you go. That's true. That's true. Because sometimes um, well, I I remember what I would listen to country music, and some people that I was living with they didn't like country music, and not all country like country music can be super cheesy. I get that, but sometimes you're in the mood for super cheese, you know? But you're right, like if your partner doesn't like it. Okay, so for the instrument, did it matter, you know, what in like string instrument, piano, no trombone, nothing like that. No, we don't have that. Yeah, information. Okay. So what are some of the theories behind how music can do this? And and maybe start with listening, because most I probably more people listen to music regularly than people who you know play an instrument. But I'm curious, like what are the proposed mechanisms of action as to hey, this could be why music could help prevent dementia?

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Yeah, so there are a few different possibilities, and there is there is existing research um that has looked at so as people have undergone brain scans, so imaging of their brain, and they play different music, or they put on music, firstly, as they're in the brain, um, having their brain scanned. And so basically, they have shown that listening to music really stimulates multiple regions of your brain. It's not just one area of your brain which which reacts and responds when you listen to music, it's it's multiple regions. So, in a way, we think about it like a whole brain workout. So you're really getting that complete activation of the different neural networks in different areas of your brain. Um, so some of the areas that it impacts on are things like um emotion and kind of your sensory areas. So music can be used to help people relax. Um, it can make them feel good, it can make them cry. So, all those areas are really being triggered when you listen to music. Um, it can also activate areas like the motor cortex, so where you feel like moving. So the music can make you want to tap your hands or dance or yeah, even just um yeah, clap your hands, just really respond to that rhythm that you're hearing from the music. And so, together these aspects really help. Um, so we know that music can can reduce stress. So some people listen to music and it can really calm them down. You can be really not feeling great, stressed, aggravated, can't sleep at night, you put some music on, and it really has a calming effect. So there have been studies that have also shown music can be beneficial for reducing blood pressure, calming your heart rate. So we know that it's having benefits on your heart as well, so cardiovascular benefits, and there is a close relationship between the heart and the brain.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Right, and you did a study on that too. You you guys looked at that too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:15

Yeah. So so there are a lot of a lot of possible reasons, which are both direct reasons why music can be stimulating, can be cognitively stimulating, which we know anything that really uh stimulates you cognitively is beneficial to help delay the onset of dementia. But it can also be through things like reducing uh perhaps your risk of cardiovascular um type events, and through reducing your risk of things like stress and depression, which we know are also linked to an increased risk of dementia.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

Yeah. So it's kind of powerful in a sense, with the many ways it could keep us healthy for as long as possible or functional. Yeah, better functional.

SPEAKER_03 21:01

So it is really multifaceted and um having flow-on effects in terms of being good overall for for our body. And it it is an observation. So our work is an observational study. So meaning that we cannot establish direct cause and effect. Uh we don't know if somebody who never listened to music, if they started listening, whether that would be beneficial for them. We can't determine that from this this type of research. But what we can say is that we found a link, and that link is supported by existing evidence. So it may suggest that there is a is a direct relationship. Um, but we just can't determine that for for sure.

SPEAKER_01 21:46

Right. And in your population, um people hadn't yet developed dementia who right. But I'm just curious if it may have a positive impact, you know, folks who already have the diet. Diagnosis for some of the reasons you talked about.

SPEAKER_03 22:04

Well, so that's um that's a really fascinating area, and there's been um some excellent work that's been done in the US as well. So Dan Cohen in the US, he's done some amazing work um in this area. So he's at there's actually a documentary um that he produced, a really powerful documentary, um maybe about 10 years ago now, where he brought music into um aged care and nursing homes. And for individuals who had some individuals had quite severe uh dementia um and were not really communicating or engaging at all. And he put music on. He had he had pod uh, you know, the old iPods that people used to listen to. Oh yeah. He put them on and these people responded. I mean, people responded, people people who were non-responsive responded, so it was really triggering something for them. And in particular, what his um his work and work of others has suggested that there are periods in your life, so certain music um has a different impact than other music, and the music that you listen to when you're a teenager in particular seems to be quite powerful.

SPEAKER_01 23:31

Oh, that's interesting. So that's like has a big impact. So if I'm like older, when I get old, I don't know if I'll be demented or not, knock on wood. But um, if I listened to music that I liked when I was a teen, it might do something more for me. I don't know how I'll remember that. I'll have to write it down.

SPEAKER_03 23:53

After my conversations with him, I must say that I went onto Spotify and I started, he said, just just you know, Google best songs from the year that corresponds to when you're between around 12 and 17. And so I started doing that. And it is true that you hear music that you haven't heard for a very long time, that you forgot, and but it transports you back, it it and it triggers something in you that is very difficult to explain.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

Yeah. And maybe that's all you need, like when you're that at that state, you know, maybe like to just those little moments of micro enjoyment, maybe joy. I mean, yeah. That's interesting. Why that why that time frame? Maybe it's like a lot of first during that time frame.

SPEAKER_03 24:45

Yeah, something to do, yeah, with still the areas of your brain that are developing. Uh, but I do think, yeah, as you say, it's I mean, it's a period of you know, massive hormonal changes, the brain's developing, you're learning so much. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:03

You remember your first crushes and um yeah, who they like that you're I still remember, so I mean, there's certain songs, and I'll be like, oh yeah, that was the song of our sophomore party, you know, and you still remember who you danced with and who you didn't dance with, who you wanted to dance with, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:22

Um so I've I've often thought though, it just shows you that music and I think smells can be the same as well, but it can really be unique to an event. And if you really want to remember an event that's important, maybe you should be put playing a particular song over and over again. Because then into the future, when you hear that song, maybe that will help you remember that particular event more powerfully than you would otherwise.

SPEAKER_01 25:53

Oh, I love that. That's uh that can be kind of like a fun imagination exercise, too, you know?

SPEAKER_02 25:59

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:00

I love I love that. I heard a song I hadn't heard in so long, and uh like last week, and it brought me back to this pizza party when I was a kid at this Lake Harvey's Harvey's Lake, and I remembered like this boy, he was on the boys' soccer team, I was on the girls' soccer team, and I had a crush on him at the time. I mean, my crushes would change like weekly, and but I and I just remember the dance floor and like me wanting to dance to the song to kind of like show off a little bit. I wasn't like a great dancer, but you think in your head, like, oh, I'm gonna dance so this get this guy's attention. But it was just funny how it all came back to me at once. I don't think it worked, by the way, but uh that's okay. So I wanted to ask you too when you play an instrument, it's different, right? It's it's like a different memory. And sometimes, and I'm sure I don't know if you're familiar with Glenn Campbell or like you see a music somebody who was a musician and then they get dementia, and all of a sudden, like if you put them on stage or if you start playing playing their song, like they automatically just go right back to it. It's almost like miraculous, unless you're someone like you who studies the brain and you can explain it. But for someone who's watching it, you're like, wow, that was powerful. Like, how did how are they able to do that? So it's a is it a different mechanism when you're playing, when you're a musician versus just listening?

SPEAKER_03 27:20

Yeah, it's a it's a good question. Um, so there are, I've spoken to a lot of people who we work with a lot of people who have dementia or their carers for people with dementia. And we've heard stories of people with quite advanced dementia who are no longer communicating but can still go to their piano and play. So the areas of the brain that are involved in in playing music are areas that are not um not damaged, they're not damaged until quite late in the disease process. So it means that you can continue to be engaging in in music, even even with quite severe uh dementia. So initially we thought initially our our hypothesis was that because playing a musical instrument also has the complexity of actually playing versus uh a more passive just listening to music, we thought that we might see a stronger beneficial effect. And we didn't, which was a little bit surprising. But we wonder if some of that could be because these were older individuals and a lot of them who had been playing music had probably been playing music for a large part of their life, and so it probably didn't require the same cognitive challenges as say if you were taking up a musical instrument for the first time. So it was almost something. Um it's like when people can hop in a car and just drive and you're actually on autopilot, you're not really even thinking about all the things you're doing. I think for some musicians that that's that's the case. They're so familiar with it that they almost get taken away and absorbed in it, but they're not actually, it doesn't require the same cognitive challenges as it would if I was required to sit at a piano and try and play.

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Yeah, no, you're absolutely and you and you see when you think of some of your favorite musicians, what what you just described, you can see almost, you know, it's almost like they don't even, it's like it's like so easy for them, and it's just part of who they are, and they're just they don't miss a note and it's all just coming out, and you're like, wow, that's so cool. Yeah, yeah. So talented. But I like I think it's it's really neat to think about when you think when you just like you can't communicate anymore, you know, maybe verbally, you can't have a conversation, but then when you can just play an instrument, it's like this beautiful form of communication and connection, um, which I think is so powerful, you know. If you can do it, can do it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:05

Yeah, and I think I think that's what's really important is for people who have advanced dementia finding uh ways that they can still hopefully have pleasure in in some of those activities. And it can also be really powerful for their family because they can see that that individual is still engaging in something that they always loved.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

Yeah, that's true. Like if they're content and you can see that as a as an outside observer. Yeah. Are you doing other studies? I we were talking about music and dementia today, but are you studying other types of things in terms of prevention?

SPEAKER_03 30:44

Yeah, so we were actually really just from the music um research, we were actually interested in can we test this more formally and how would we test this? Um, so there's been other studies that have done things like um looked at engagement in choirs. Um, and so, you know, people going to singing classes. Uh, so we are considering whether there would be an option of a of a small trial in older individuals in a particular area where we live in Melbourne, um, where there is a higher proportion of older individuals, um, and whether we could could look at having a randomized trial where we encourage half the group to attend regular music sessions and the other half. Yeah. Because that would be, we would really be able to distinguish cause and effect with that type of study. Um said that, it wouldn't just be music, they would be going to a regular activity where they'd also be getting the social engagement.

SPEAKER_01 31:51

That's true.

SPEAKER_03 31:52

It's it becomes challenging, and the biggest challenge with those type of studies is also that then you need to follow them over quite a long period of time because it takes a while for dementia to develop. Um, so it can't be a study where you just look over one year. Um, and that's the biggest one of the biggest challenges in dementia prevention, that we don't know if something you're doing now or changing now is going to have an effect in 10 years or 20 years. And it can be very challenging to to collect solid data and information to really answer those questions.

SPEAKER_01 32:29

Right. And we're not in a vacuum, so it's you wonder like, does one factor in impact a person more than another factor? You know, do two factors together impact? And it I it's complicated. It's hard to figure out, but it's nice to see trends, you know. I think if we can latch on to trends.

SPEAKER_03 32:50

Yeah. And I also think with things like this, it it all it doesn't hurt. So it's a bit like a bit like other things. So if you if you don't mind doing crosswords occasionally or finding a few activities which stimulate your brain, why not turn on the music a bit more often or you know, listen to music, um, find music you enjoy and listen to it, engage with it. It's not gonna be detrimental to you and it could be positive. Um, and you could find other benefits in terms of um, I know some people listen to particular music just before they go to sleep because they really find that that yeah, yeah. So give it a give it a go, I say to uh you know, I'm not gonna guarantee that that's gonna help uh preserve your cognitive function for longer, but it's not gonna hurt, is it?

SPEAKER_01 33:44

So no, it's not. I I don't I guess the only way it could hurt is if you turn up your volume so high and blow out your ears, like which right, because like no hearing is another risk factor, modifiable risk factor. And well, in most cases, some cases, uh, you want to try to protect your hearing, and you know that may help. So I guess if you're listening to music, you don't want to like listen too loud. You get we get I get warnings on my cell phone when I run now, like turn down your music, it's too loud. I'm like, okay. I'm like, is it? But yeah, I think uh you're right. Like, how can it hurt? I can't really think of a way. It can lead you into other creative endeavors and working out and all that, which you talked about. I read your other paper um and how it may help with blood pressure and heart rate, obviously, two things that you need to care about as you get older. And yeah, you're right, it gets you moving, you know? Like, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 34:47

Yeah, and that's what I think one of the important things from this research is providing the opportunity for um, I think for dissemination more broadly. So it's been good because I've been contacted by a lot of radio stations in Australia as well, and have been able to talk about this and to talk about this is a potential, a potential strategy that older people can can use, um, and it could be beneficial for you. So we like to say that I mean, most people know that engaging in physical activity is important, and we should be eating well, and that's important. But to add to that, we need to think about social engagement. So I think that's increasingly recognized that uh keeping social connections and not being isolated is important. To that, we should be adding things like keeping the mind active so as much as possible, finding new things to keep your mind stimulated as you get older. Um music is one of those. Music is one of those activities that keeps your mind stimulated. So these are all important things people can be doing because they're constantly asked, you know, older individuals they start becoming quite concerned about developing dementia and they say, What can we do? What can we do now? Yeah, so these are just strategies that can be incorporated into people's daily lives that maybe will be beneficial for them.

SPEAKER_01 36:12

Absolutely. And it's you know very accessible as opposed to some things, right? Some health interventions that you can't get access to. This is something that anybody can do, which uh makes it even more appealing, you know, from a public health perspective. Like anybody can do it. So have you gotten a lot of good feedback? Um how is how's that been getting like all the the media attention? Do you like it?

SPEAKER_03 36:38

It's been it's been interesting. Um yeah, I mean it's great, it's always great. As a um, I work in the school of public health, and so I think really part of my my role as a scientist is to be um promoting these public health messages. So it's provided a really great platform to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_01 37:01

Um that's that's great. So, what do you hope the take-home message is from is it what you just said basically from your research?

SPEAKER_03 37:12

I think so. I mean, I I've said to people that I start I honestly have started listening to music more than I have before. And I think it's just reminded me that I do enjoy music and sometimes I I don't have the reflex to listen to it as much as maybe I I could or I should. So I think people should give it a try. If they're if they're not if they're not listening to music, have a go. Have try it, try the thing about finding music from when you're a teenager and see if um that triggers something in you.

SPEAKER_01 37:50

I I think that's such a great exercise. We can like assign that to our listeners. Like go back, find the music that you listen to as a teen and see how it makes you feel, and maybe write it down. And maybe you could submit answers, send them to you, and you could do the fancy statistics. Oh, I would love to love to know that. I don't know if we'll get a lot enough people, but um, I it I think it could be a fun, you know, exercise for people to do at home, anyways.

SPEAKER_03 38:18

So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

What are you working on next? Are are you are you doing more research or teaching?

SPEAKER_03 38:24

Yeah, so we're we're continuing to to look at different uh potential interventions, so really trying to move to a clinical trial, um, trying to think about what we can do for older individuals, so people who are over over 80 and people that are in their 90s. So we've got a lot of different projects which have started, but um a lot of them need more funding to continue. So at this stage, we're we're we're writing grants really, spending our time writing grant proposals to try and get additional funding.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

I know it's so hard. And that's part of what I want people to understand on this podcast too, and I'm glad you said that, is because it's you know, there's all these great research questions, but if it doesn't get the funding, you can't do them, you know. So it's like you're they need to fund these things. I mean, there's so much money for certain things and treatment and healthcare, but like the prevention stuff, I really hope we can start funding that more. There's the interest, there's the social interest.

SPEAKER_03 39:26

I think so.

SPEAKER_01 39:27

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_03 39:28

And and then they're not necessarily easy. I mean, it's not easy to work. I shouldn't say it's not easy to work with, but there are challenges when the cohort is older individuals because they have a lot of there's a lot of changes that are going on in their life. There's health conditions, there's limitations, they can't move as easily. So that does present some challenges just in terms of the study and the funding that's needed, which tends to be more than if you're working with a younger cohort who could just be doing things online and responding to surveys, and it would be quite you know straightforward.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

Getting old is not a picnic, but I guess it beats the alternative. So I don't we can't move the game board, can we, that much? Um, although people are trying, there's all these, you know, all these like biohacker types trying to stay like they're like what like 70 years old, and actually my biological age is 30, and here's what I do. I mean, right, we're in that era though. It's kind of everyone's trying to it is true.

SPEAKER_03 40:35

That that's taken off a lot. Um, I think what's important is not only the living healthy lives as long as possible, but also being um being happy, so being the quality of the life. Amen.

SPEAKER_01 40:52

Yeah, that's so important. Absolutely. I that's what I said, like function and joy. So, you know, and if I if you go on social media, especially maybe especially if you're a woman and you see like it's so reductive how people view aging. They're like, it's like the lines in your face, or it's you know, how big your cheeks are, and I'm like, or what color your hair is. I'm like, oh my god, that is like the least of my worries because to me it's so much more about the stuff you're talking about, you know, function, whether I enjoy life, because the other stuff, I'm like, whatever, like that's gonna come and you know, it is what it is, but I don't care what anybody does. I'm like, do whatever you want. But like, if I can't remember stuff, that's gonna matter more than like how many lines I have on my forehead, like, you know. So um to me, that's kind of yeah. But I think if we could make bring that kind of stuff more into the mainstream topic of like aging or fear of aging, and just you know, I don't know, I think it'd be good, you know, because it's not just outward appearance, it's um what's going on on the inside that matters more.

SPEAKER_03 41:58

I think and and just making sure, like as you said before, things like music that's accessible to everyone. So yeah, we're we're not talking about keeping the the really rich, a small proportion of society who are rich and who can afford these expensive treatments, and keeping them living longer. We want it to be equitable, um, and that everyone can have the best, best possible life that they can.

SPEAKER_01 42:28

Yeah, you don't need like the golden ticket to Willy Wonka's factory, like you can you can just listen to music at home. But this was great, and thanks so much for coming on. Um, I look forward to sharing this for sure and hearing my my listeners' feedback on it. But it's it's powerful stuff, you know, that anybody can do this. And I love music. Music is so magical to me, you know, just because of what you describe and like all the different areas of the brain that may be at work, and it's kind of fun to think about that, like the whole is bigger than the parts, you know. So yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:04

Well, it's been great talking to you.

SPEAKER_01 43:06

Yeah, yeah. And enjoy your morning there and stay in touch if you do have any other published research, because this is right up my alley. I'm in public health, I always want to talk about the prevention stuff. I do some of the treatment stuff too, but this is more what I think people really want to hear, you know, and and get answers for. So yeah. All right. Well, I my dog is like driving me nuts right now, so I gotta take him out, even though it was raining earlier, so he didn't want to go out, and now he's like, let's go. And has it stopped raining? I mean, a little bit. It's been dreary all day. It's funny. I woke up this morning and I laughed because it said 100% chance of rain. And I'm like, man, they're very sure of themselves. You know, like I don't think I ever say 100% chance of rain. 100%. I'm like, okay, maybe the weatherman wrote that when he was like looking out the window and saw that it was raining. He's like raining. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 44:00

But well, I'm gonna try, I've got a dog, so I'm gonna try the music on him and see if he responds differently.

SPEAKER_01 44:06

I swear, look it up. I don't you'll probably think I'm crazy, but I heard reggae music. But of course, you wonder because you're like, well, whenever I play any kind of like soft music, like lullabies, reggae, Barnaby's like super calm and chill. Uh, but even if I play like Blast from the 1980s, he seems to act the same way. So I'm like, how did they do this study? I have to look into it. But then if I play him like Yeah, it's interesting, but I always experiment with him, like you know, what kind of music uh is gonna like you know rally him up or keep him calm. But he does like played like cats meowing once. He didn't seem to care, wolves howling. I was like, oh, does this bring you back to like you know some some kind of evolution thing that takes you back? But no, he didn't act any differently. So I don't know, but but I find reggae kind of calming too, you know, like I do. So I don't know, but well, let me know. Try it on your dog, and if something okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:09

And then we'll design it, we'll design a proper experiment where we can test it.

SPEAKER_01 45:16

Yeah, well, my dad's a veterinarian, so I can you know have dogs enroll for the study. You have access, yeah. I have access, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:24

That would actually be useful because you know, some dogs get quite stressed when they go to the yes, they do. Maybe the music, the reggae music could be tested.

SPEAKER_01 45:33

That's a really good idea. Yeah, it is actually a really good idea. So, well, maybe we could do the study together. And uh I I do have the dog, so and it's not it's it wouldn't be asking them much to sign up, you know, it's just listening to tunes. So this is good. I like this. All right. So all right, thanks so much, Dr. Ryan. I appreciate it, I appreciate your time. Okay. Bye. All right, thank you guys for joining in for today's episode. Don't forget to check out some of the other episodes, the interviews, the WTF Health News, the Eek Speaks Easy, and subscribe to the podcast, the newsletter, and you can do all of that in the show notes. All right, and now it's time for the closing quote. This one is from Aldos Huxley. After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. Awesome, love it. Okay, have a great day out there wherever you are, and goodbye for now.