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General Medicine & Health Science Fair Project

Music Tempo and Blood Pressure

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Music Tempo and Blood Pressure | Science Fair Projects | STEM Projects
Can the speed of a song change your blood pressure? Fast music makes people tap their feet. Slow music helps people relax. But does the tempo actually shift a measurable body function? You measure the resting blood pressure of eight volunteers. Then each person listens to slow classical music for four minutes. You take another reading right after. Next you repeat the process with fast classical music. Slow music lowered blood pressure overall. Fast music raised the systolic (top number) reading but lowered the diastolic (bottom number).

Hypothesis

The hypothesis is that the fast tempo music will raise a boy's blood pressure and the slow tempo music will lower their blood pressure.

Method & Materials

You will need to enlist the help of a nurse, recruit 8 boys in the 6th grade, and have them sit quietly in a chair for 5 minutes. Then you will play a slow tempo song for 4 minutes and take their blood pressure. Then you will repeat the same steps with a fast tempo song.
You will need 2 stop watches, a tape recorder, a nurse, a sphygmomanometer with adult medium cuff, 8 6th grade boys, a fast tempo classical music recording, a slow tempo classical music recording, and 3 chairs.

Results

The results of the experiment showed that the slow tempo music lowered blood pressure and the fast tempo music raised the systolic pressure but lowered the diastolic pressure. This suggests that the hypothesis should be rejected.

Why do this project?

This science project is interesting because it can help parents determine what type of music their school age children should listen to at bedtime.

Also Consider

Variations of this experiment could include testing the effects of music on girls or testing different genres of music.

Full project details

Additional information and source material for this project are available below.

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