A recent study led by King’s College London shows that heart rate and respiration respond to music, suggesting music therapy could be used to treat heart conditions.
Music appeals to our psychology – we listen to it to overcome stress, boost energy during workouts and find a bit of escapism. Recently, there has been growing speculation that music can even control our body’s autonomic functions like heart rate. The main obstacle for “music therapies” was that scientists didn’t know exactly how music affected our body. Scientists at King’s College London, however, may have found the answer to that question.
Research team led by Natalia Cotic, a PhD student, built on previous evidence that physiological activities, such as heartbeat and respiration rate, mirror external musical cues. Scientists analysed the structure of Verdi opera pieces as a series of Gaussian curves (bell curves) centred on perceptually salient segmentation points.
Graph by Cotic et al. (2026) showing the frequent changes in instrumentation, vocal texture, and dynamics. From ‘Autonomic entrainment to music structure in Verdi opera’ in the European Heart Journal, vol 4. https://doi.org/10.1093/ehjimp/qyag025
Perceptually salient segmentation points are essentially moments that grab our attention. In music, these are boundaries that stand out from the rest of the piece because they have a change in tempo or loudness. These boundaries can be pointed out ‘objectively’ using the trained eye or felt ‘subjectively’. It is important to investigate the impact of the objective or the subjective experience of music on our physiological activity, because it may influence the effectiveness and applicability of the treatment.
The research involved 24 participants – 12 were choristers, the other 12 were not musically trained. Their heart rate, blood pressure and respiration rate were measured while listening to the track. Afterwards, they were told to mark boundaries that stood out from the rest of the piece.
Research showed the participants’ physiological activities were better aligned with objective salient segmentation points, meaning that the objective structure of music outweighed the participant’s subjective experience. Physiological activity responded to the structure of music regardless of musical understanding.
This finding paves the way for future music therapy. A certain type of music may be able to stimulate rhythmic cardiac flexes which would be a gentle yet effective way to treating patients with cardiovascular problems, especially for those who are physically immobile or going through post-operative recovery.
“In the future we could select or create music that encourages your heart muscles to flex, aiding cardiac fitness … Music could be used to keep their heart pliable and elastic, supporting rehabilitation and heart health” Natalia Cotic told the press office at King’s College London.
The research on the relationship between music and the body holds great promise. Understanding how the rhythms of physiological functions arise may allow us to tackle the cause of rhythm-based disorders. Furthermore, “music therapies” would be a safe, non-invasive treatment that is cheap and accessible to a wide range of the population.
By Kazuma Oura, July 3, 2026.
Edited by Eloise Trawick and Marina Milsum
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