Women Are Less Disrupted By Music Than Men, New Study Says

A new study found out that when at work, women are less distracted by music than men.

BBC reported that a study published in the Medical Journal of Australia has discovered a significant difference between men and women when it comes to music and work. They found out that women are better at concentrating than men, especially in a place where rock and classical music are played.

The team aimed to discover the effect of music to people at work. While some people enjoy listening to their favorite songs while working, some would just prefer a peaceful and quiet setting during a task.

For the study, researchers at the Royal College of Music and Imperial College instructed 350 people to extract body parts using tweezers in a board game called Operation. During the game, participants should be able to remove as many parts without touching the board while listening to Australian rock band AC/DC's song Thunderstruck, Mozart's Andante and just regular music played inside an operating room on headphones.

The researchers found out that women were able to extract more parts faster regardless of the kind of music played, while men did slower when rock music was on. Though the male group did better with Mozart's piano music, it was only because they like to listen to classical music.

"Although classical music was associated with a lower perceived distraction during the game, this effect was attenuated when factoring in how much people liked the music, with suggestions that only people who are particular fans of Mozart found it beneficial," the researchers wrote. "This lack of improvement in performance when listening to Mozart does not support the so-called Mozart effect, which suggests that Mozart's compositions can aid spatial task performance."

This study shows that men are more susceptible to auditory stress than women.