Here it comes again, I am travelling to Finland for my studies. Having lived there for two years, I know that there are two periods when I enjoy the weather: when it is really cold and the landscape looks like a scene from a Christmas movie, and when it is constantly bright, and the never-ending days of summer reward people with a flux of energy after the long winter. Since universities (and the whole country) is closed during summer, I always try to time my visits during January or February.
This was the time to conduct my experiment and collect data for my research to better understand how music can help to relax people in the challenging environment of the Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans. With its tight space and loud noise, these scans at least uncomfortable, but most often they induce anxiety or claustrophobic reactions.
I knew that these weeks will be challenging, but nothing could prepare me for the workload of recreating the environment of a diagnostic institution in the Studio Musica, which is the recording studio of the University of Jyväskylä. It involved creating an artificial Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) equipment, which for my father deserves enormous credits, synchronising the recording of the physiological measurements (such as an accelerometer, heart rate variability, skin conductance and respiration sensors) with the music conditions, and create (and rehearse) a smooth procedure that is executed the same way for all the participants, nonetheless providing a music listening experience that is based on individual music preference.
It was an incredible team work with my supervisors (Dr. Esa Ala-Ruona and Dr. Birgitta Burger) among others. I learnt a lot, did a lot of mistakes and felt proud of myself for executing all these things within a short time frame. But this was the easy part, now I have to understand and analyse all the data, and make sense of what happened with the participants on a physiological and subjective level. More info is coming!
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