This is your song: Using participants' music selections to evoke nostalgia and autobiographical memories efficiently.
Almost everyone has experienced the unexpected tang of nostalgia (Wildschut, Sedikides, Arndt, Routledge, 2006) Nostalgic experiences are characterized by autobiographical memories that feel self relevant and are filled with warm, positively toned feelings about friends, romantic partners, family, or childhood (Hepper, Ritchie, Sedikides, Wildschut, 2012; Hepper et al. 2014; Holak Havlena, 1992; Wildschut et al. 2006) that contribute to making one's life feel meaningful (Routledge et al. 2011) Although positive feelings are at the forefront, negative feelings may also be present (Barrett et al. 2010; Wildschut et al. 2006) often as a longing for someone or something in the past or grieving for something gone (Hepper et al. 2012, 2014).Music as a Trigger for Nostalgia and Autobiographical MemoriesMusic is undoubtedly capable of influencing how one feels. Using an experience sampling method, Juslin, Liljestrom, Vastfjall, Barradas, and Silva (2008) found that in 64% of episodes where music was present, the music playing affected how the listener felt. It is important to note that nostalgia can be aroused by music (Barrett et al. 2010; Janata, Tomic, Rakowski, 2007; Wildschut et al. 2006) For example, Zentner, Grandjean, and Scherer (2008) used factor analysis to identify nine emotional states prompted by music and found that nostalgia formed one of those factors. Therefore, it is no surprise that some researchers have turned to music to evoke nostalgia and the autobiographical memories that frequently accompany nostalgic experiences.When music is used to evoke nostalgia or autobiographical memories, researchers have typically played popular music from a participant's preadolescence to young adulthood without regard to each person's music preferences (see, e.g. Barrett et al. 2010; Janata et al. 2007) This approach is based on the idea that autobiographical memories formed in preadolescence through early adulthood tend to be particularly salient (Rubin, Rahhal, Poon, 1998) and music from that time is linked to emotions that can last into one's later years (Schulkind, Hennis, Rubin, 1999).1 However, evoking nostalgia with this approach has had limited success. Although participants are often familiar with songs from their past (Schulkind et al. 1999) the songs do not reliably prompt nostalgia or autobiographical memories. For example, Barrett et al. (2010) played songs that were on the Billboard Top 100 pop, hip hop, and R&B lists when each participant was between 7 and 19 years old. Although participants often found these songs to be familiar, only 26% of them were rated as being at least somewhat nostalgic. Notably, even this somewhat low rate was obtained using a rather lenient definition of nostalgia (a rating of 3 5 on a 5 point Likert scale) Similarly, researchers have used this approach to prompt autobiographical memories. Using a technique almost identical to the one already described, Janata et al. (2007) found that only 29% of songs elicited autobiographical memories from participants, although participants frequently found the songs to be familiar. As Barrett et al. concluded, musicevoked nostalgia is largely idiosyncratic, and there are no particular songs that consistently elicit nostalgia across individuals.Selecting songs more closely suited to each individual should create higher rates of nostalgia. For example, Routledge et al. (2011) found that when participants thought of songs that made them feel nostalgic, they reported experiencing more nostalgia than when they listened to recent popular songs (Study 1) In addition, they found that when participants read lyrics to songs they found nostalgic, they experienced more nostalgia than when they read control lyrics (Study 2) Although these methods take participants' preferences into account, thinking of nostalgic songs and reading lyrics of nostalgic songs are less immersive than actually listening to songs.