The stimulus of melody produced an
immediate increase in the afflux of blood to the brain.[102]
In Germany the question was investigated at about the same time by
Mentz.[103] Observing the pulse with a sphygmograph and Marey tambour he
found distinct evidence of an effect on the heart; when attention was
given to the music the pulse was quickened, in the absence of attention it
was slowed; Mentz also found that pleasurable sensations tended to slow
the pulse and disagreeable ones to quicken it.
Binet and Courtier made an elaborate series of experiments on the action
of music on the respiration (with the double pneumograph), the heart, and
the capillary circulation (with the plethysmograph of Hallion and Comte)
on a single subject, a man very sensitive to music and himself a cultured
musician. Simple musical sounds with no emotional content accelerated the
respiration without changing its regularity or amplitude. Musical
fragments, mostly sung, usually well known to the subject, and having an
emotional effect on him, produced respiratory irregularity either in
amplitude or rapidity of breathing, in two-thirds of the trials. Exciting
music, such as military marches, accelerated the breathing more than sad
melodies, but the intensity of the excitation had an effect at least as
great as its quality, for intense excitations always produced both
quickened and deeper breathing.
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