Globalizing adolescence: Digital music cultures and music therapy

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, digital technology has connected adolescents to a global youth culture that subverts and bypasses traditional means of consuming music. In health-related contexts, adolescents can use digital tools to sample, edit, layer, manipulate, and record their own soundscapes, which allows them to have agency over their own narratives and share them with others. Concurrently, therapists acquire empathy for the lived experience of an adolescent by understanding the use of, and attuning to, the digital production components of songs used and created in therapy. Using the author’s first-person experience with digital technology and adolescents in music therapy, this chapter investigates the evolving role of digital music and media for both adolescents and therapists, exploring the ways it can (re)connect youth to a global community and have their voices heard.

Wellbeing, young people, and music scenes

This chapter considers how young people’s involvement in a local or virtual music scene can be important in terms of providing them with a sense of self-worth and esteem. Although the topic of music scenes has been comprehensively researched in academic scholarship, the connection between scene membership and physical and psychological wellbeing has not to date been a topic of focus. The chapter draws on original empirical data generated during interviews with young people in Margaret River, Western Australia, in 2016–17. Although our research findings originate from a localized source, they can be extrapolated to broader debates concerning the relationship between young people, music, and wellbeing.

Working in music with adolescents who experience disability

Working in music with adolescents who experience disability to support their health and wellbeing involves creating opportunities for their emotional expression and successful interaction with others. Music is a resource that can highlight their capabilities, yet they might need the support of a music therapist to maximize the positive affordances that music can provide. In this chapter, two contrasting examples of music therapy work, with adolescents who have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and those who have intellectual disability, are offered to demonstrate how young people have engaged with music therapy group processes and in turn developed positive relationships and self-identities. Music making can be a motivating and enjoyable activity for adolescents with disabilities, and a powerful resource to support their personal growth, autonomy, and sense of wellbeing.

Personality traits and music in adolescence

For centuries, and across cultures, people have wondered what kind of relationship there is between music and human nature. A personality psychology perspective may address this fundamental question on music by considering that personality traits are dispositions that constitute part of human nature. Hence, the classic question about how music is associated with human nature may at least in part be answered by examining if and how personality traits and music are interrelated. The objective of this chapter is to review the recent literature on personality traits and music in adolescence, with an eye on wellbeing. The first part discusses possible interrelations between personality traits and music listening. The second part considers putative relationships between personality traits and music making. Research directions are briefly outlined.

Music and violence: Working with youth to prevent violence

The prevention of youth violence is one of the major challenges of our time. Based on important key concepts on youth violence from the report of the World Health Organization, opportunities are presented for music therapy with youth to prevent violence. As music in its various forms reaches a very large number of young people all around the world on an emotional level, it is important to note its special ability to promote aggressive emotions as well as to regulate these same emotions. Integrated with more mainstream approaches, music therapy can have preventive potential at different levels: in individual settings, group programmes, and community approaches. Different music therapy approaches for the challenges of violence prevention are presented and developmental tasks for the future are discussed.

Crystallizing the relationship between adolescents, music, and emotions

The ways that young people use music to work with emotions is impressively diverse and difficult to box into categories of good and bad, helpful and unhelpful. The intersection of where, when, and why the young person is using music is further complicated by what music, what associations, and what conscious and unconscious intentions the young person has. This introductory chapter canvasses the vast landscape of music, adolescents, and emotions, using the lens of crystallization to consider the different perspectives offered by young people, music therapists, and music psychologists. The result is a rich and varied picture that places agency in the hands of the young person and encourages all caring adults to engage with the multiple possibilities that music affords.

‘What’s the WiFi code in here?’: Connecting with adolescents in music therapy

Introducing the third section of the Handbook, which broadly addresses connectedness, music, and adolescents, this chapter focuses on the context of a secondary school in the United Kingdom for students with social, emotional, and mental health needs, and explores how music therapy can help young people find creative new ways of connecting. The importance of the music therapy space, the resources, and communication with teaching staff are highlighted alongside a person-centred and psychodynamic approach. One resource, the video camera, is presented as having an important role in connecting with young people in sessions. Discussed and illustrated through case examples, the camera is shown to offer young people different ways of experiencing and re-experiencing, interacting, sharing control, witnessing, and being witnessed, leading to positively adaptive interconnectedness and emotional wellbeing.

Musical preference and social identity in adolescence

The idea that a ‘musicianship of listening’ might exist alongside the more conventional notion of musicianship based on composition, improvisation, and performance forms the starting point of our analysis of the importance and function of musical preferences in adolescence. We consider adolescents’ musical preferences, a key part of their social identities, in the context of broader lifespan changes in musical preference, looking in particular at the explanatory power of the notion of ‘open-earedness’. We consider the main psychological theories of adolescent musical preference, distinguishing between those based on social identity theory and those which adopt different sociocultural approaches. There can be no doubt that musical preferences form a central part of the identities of many adolescents, and that the notion of a musicianship of listening can help explain why these preferences are integral to their social relationships and wellbeing.

Music as a resource for agency and empowerment in identity construction

Identity construction is the defining process of youth. Adolescents are renegotiating a multitude of fundamental self-perceptions from body image to social roles. At the same time, their self-regulatory skills are still developing, and society is placing increased demands on responsible behaviour, yet not always facilitating adolescents’ own abilities to act and voice. All this is challenging for adolescents’ sense of agency, the experience of being the actor in their lives, and holding ownership of their feelings, thoughts, and actions. This chapter discusses music as a resource for supporting agency during identity construction. In many ways, music is the space in which adolescents can be the actors of their life, give voice to their feelings and throughts, safely search for themselves, and feel ownership of their actions. Music can empower adolescents and facilitate their indentity construction by fostering their own capacity for self-reflection, self-regulation, self-expression, and participation. The chapter introduces the identity section of this book, discussing how music functions as an empowering playground for agency in healthy development, and also how music can restore agency when it has been compromised.

Measuring adolescents’ emotional responses to music: Approaches, challenges, and opportunities

Contemporary challenges facing researchers and practitioners in measuring and understanding the various components of emotional responses to music need to be balanced with informed, active participation from young people. For researchers, measurement can encompass both process and outcome indicators that provide the capacity to monitor change over time and examine the impact of music-based interventions on mental health and wellbeing. For practitioners, measurement forms a fundamental aspect of the needs analysis so that therapeutic sessions can be tailored to suit individuals’ needs. This chapter presents information about the types of methods and factors that need to be considered for future work measuring emotional responses to music in young people. The benefits and challenges of utilizing mixed-methods approaches will also be considered. This chapter concludes that a considered, integrative approach of measurement will provide richer insight into research on the role of music in the lives of young people.