The Oxford Handbook of Music Psychology

The field of Music Psychology has grown dramatically in the past 20 years, to emerge from being just a minor topic to one of mainstream interest within the brain sciences. However, until now, there has been no comprehensive reference text in the field.
The Oxford Handbook of Music Psychology is a landmark text providing, for the first time ever, a comprehensive overview of the latest developments in this fast-growing area of research. With contributions from over fifty experts in the field, the range and depth of coverage is unequalled. All the chapters combine a solid review of the relevant literature with well-reasoned arguments and robust discussions of the major findings, as well as original insights and suggestions for future work.
Written by leading experts, the 52 chapters are divided into 11 sections covering both experimental and theoretical perspectives, each edited by an internationally recognised authority
Ten sections each present chapters that focus on specific areas of music psychology:

- the origins and functions of music
- music perception
- responses to music
- music and the brain
- musical development
- learning musical skills
- musical performance
- composition and improvisation
- the role of music in our everyday lives
- music therapy and conceptual frameworks
In each section, expert authors critically review the literature, highlight current issues, and explore possibilities for the future. The final section examines how in recent years the study of music psychology has broadened to include a range of other scientific disciplines. It considers the way that the research has developed in relation to technological advances, fostering links across the field and providing an overview of the areas where the field needs further development in the future.
The Oxford Handbook of Music Psychology will be the essential reference text for students and researchers across psychology and neuroscience.

Susan Hallam is Professor of Education at the Institute of Education, University of London and currently Dean of the Faculty of Policy and Society. She pursued careers as both a professional musician and a music educator before completing her psychology studies and becoming an academic in 1991 in the department of Educational Psychology at the Institute. Her research interests include disaffection from school, ability grouping and homework and issues relating to learning in music, practising, performing, musical ability, musical understanding and the effects of music on behaviour and studying. She is past editor of Psychology of Music, Psychology of Education Review and Learning Matters. She has twice been Chair of the Education Section of the British Psychological Society, and is currently treasurer of the British Educational Research Association, an auditor for the Quality Assurance Agency and an Academician of the Learned Societies for the Social Sciences


Ian Cross teaches at the University of Cambridge where he is Reader in Music & Science, Director of the Centre for Music & Science and a Fellow of Wolfson College. He has published widely in the field of music cognition. His principal research focus at present is on music as a biocultural phenomenon, involving collaboration with psychologists, anthropologists, archaeologists and computational neuroscientists. His research explores the biological and cultural bases for human musicality, in particular, the mechanisms underlying the capacity for achievement and maintenance of inter-individual synchrony of behaviour, those underlying the experience of meaning in engagement with music, and those involved in the cognition and perception of multi-levelled structure in both music and language.


Michael H Thaut received his masters and PhD in music from Michigan State University. He is also a graduate of the Mozarteum Music Conservatory in Salzburg/Austria. At Colorado State University he is a Professor of Music and a Professor of Neuroscience and serves as Executive Director of the School of the Arts and Chairman of the Dept of Music, Theater, and Dance. He has also directed the Center for Biomedical Research in Music for 12 years. Dr Thaut's internationally recognized research focuses on brain function in music, especially time information processing in the brain related to rhythmicity and biomedical applications of music to neurologic rehabilitation of cognitive and motor function. He has received both the National Research Award and the National Service Award from the American Music Therapy Association. He is an elected member of the World Academy of Multidisciplinary Neurotraumatology and in 2007 he was elected President of the International Society for Clinical Neuromusicology.