The musically-incline med student

[southpawcannon]

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Typo. My bad. The musically-inclined medical student

I know a majority here haven't started med school yet, but just wanted to get your opinion on the subject. Do you think being musically-inclined correlates to an increased aptitude in the sciences and subsequent success as a medical student and beyond? I.e. you've played an instrument for several years, you understand theory, you went to band camp, etc. Note: I'm not at all dismissing those musically-uninclined as being inferior.

 

[MuaHaHaHa]

Hi. You raised an interesting question but no, I've never noticed this correlation. It's not necessary for someone to be musically inclined to master math or science.

 

[Dookter]

Perhaps there is a correlation between mastering one complex, intellectually stimulating thing and mastering another complex, intellectually stimulating thing. However, I do not think musical talent necessarily is any better than any other complex talent.

 

[Kenacillin]

I don't exactly think that playing an instrument correlates with how well you do as a student. Although I do play the piano and believe if anything, it shows versatility in areas which require a different sense of intelligence and dedication.

 

[mms2k7]

OP, are you a boxer or have interest in boxing????

 

[doinmybest5840]

I don't exactly think that playing an instrument correlates with how well you do as a student. Although I do play the piano and believe if anything, it shows versatility in areas which require a different sense of intelligence and dedication.

I always wanted to learn how to play the piano. And the drums. And guitar.

 

[Long Dong]

I don't know if knowing how to break dance would constitute being musically inclined, but I did well in med school and I break dance. I've also been known to cut and scratch on the turntables as well.

 

[doinmybest5840]

I don't know if knowing how to break dance would constitute being musically inclined, but I did well in med school and I break dance. I've also been known to cut and scratch on the turntables as well.

😍 Man I think breakdancing is AWESOME! You're my new favorite person on SDN. Hahaha

 

[scrubsaresexy]

Whatever, I'll say it.

Yes, I think being a musician has a direct influence on your academics. I don't mean the type of "Oh I played trombone in the 5th grade but quit in 7th grade after I realized what I huge loser I was" muscian. I mean a true musician, who has not only mastered their instrument (be it voice or a more tangible instrument) and understands the nuances of music and the theory behind it. I think perhaps the discipline needed in being a musician probably carries over into other aspects of life. That's not to say that people who aren't musician aren't disciplined, but most of the more intellectual, thoughtful, and dedicated people I've met in college have been musicians. It's hard to even explain how it helps you, especially if you haven't ever seriously studied music...it's just incredibly intense and cathartic and so...intellectual, I guess. Maybe because it involves such intense concentration and interpretation and you have to be doing so many things at once (reading the note, playing the note, internalizing how the note functions in the phrase, interpreting the overall piece, etc etc)

I also once said (and was promptly ripped apart) that sometime being a musician is a better student because s/he is practicing instead of screwing around (watching tv, sitting in front of the computer, whatever). But like I said, I was promptly ripped apart by the class that I said that in, so I appear to be wrong

That said, I've been playing piano for 13 years, cello for 9 years, and have been singing seriously for about 6 years (opera and musical theatre). I also have been dancing for about 5 years, not including the 5 years or so when I was really young and did that cute little kid ballet stuff. I feel that all of my arts training has been so vital to being a good student. And if you think I'm arrogant, I don't really care...I'm a string player, I'm supposed to be arrogant! 😀

 

[juleswinfield]

Try Tulane...they love people who can play instruments.

 

[ssquared]

I think what the connection between being a musician and good student comes from the intellectual challenge and discipline required to be a musician. That then flows over to other areas of your life. In order to be a good musician, though, you have to be fairly smart, so maybe that's accounting for it?

All I have is anecdotal evidence, but all of my very talented musician friends from high school either went on to college to be 1) music majors or 2) science majors. There's something scientific about how music functions, and I think that appeals to a lot of people. And then I have my genius friends doing consecutive undergraduate majors in physics at Harvard and masters degrees in performance at Tanglewood. They sure don't fit any normal patterns!

 

[colbgw02]

I'm pretty sure that this has been studied and that students who play an instrument perform better in school. I'm not sure if it's a causal relationship, and I don't think that it's ever been looked at beyond highschool.

I'm sure someone could find a study if they were so inclined. I'm too lazy.

 

[ChristianJames1]

I think there may be a correlation between parents forcing their kid to play violin and do their homework?

 

[dasacohen]

do you want to start a band? this thread makes me think of my life-long dream of having a band or cover band on the side for bar-mitzvahs and various gigs...

who's in?

 

[circumspect]

I know that for me, the day just doesn't feel started-off right if before my first class I haven't gone through my morning practice routine. It gets my mind out of dreary morning mode and right into focus.

There's a lot of careful timing and deliberateness that goes into it as well as emotion and muscle memory; for me, it usually ends up being both cathartic and coordinating (fingers, breathing, eyes, and thoughts). I think it's a sure-fire way to get your mind going, but I don't doubt there are other equally effective ways to get that jump-start.

One thing that I think it gave me was a very concrete way to evaluate on my own my capacity for improvement. Every morning, I set my metronome for the day's tempo a little faster than last week's, and usually the change goes off without much of a hitch. With practice, I eventually make it so that every nuance and placement is exactly how I want it. In the sense of simply going through the motions, I am doing the exact same thing I do every other day, except gradually increasing speed. Time is my measure of improvement.

There's a big difference in the quality of my performance when I decide to skip my tempo too great of a distance -- a lot of my concentration goes to where my fingers should go and what note I should be playing to the detriment of every other aspect and the ease is gone. But with a gradual build up, the difficulty disappears and eventually I become twice as fast as I was at one point with the same amount of mental effort.

From watching other musicians much better/more practiced than I am, I am amazed by their ability. They can on sight read something that I'd spent hours on more musically and adeptly than I had been able to by that point. It's discouraging to think that it's because they're simply naturally better than you that they were able to do it -- the truth is that eventually the patterns of notes become second nature and all music is just more patterns, differently arranged.

It really makes sense to me that persistence and repetition are the keys to facilitating ease and ensuring learning. It's common sense how this would apply to any other aspect of training: the best way to learn math is to work out problems; to learn a language, you use your words. What this kind of tangible first hand knowledge does is eliminate any doubt that even if things aren't easy right away, there is no limit to your potential ability if only you apply methods of studying that are conducive to explicit learning.

Eventually, everything gets easier -- with strong foundations of knowledge, connections between novel material and pertinent things learned prior are that much more available and much more sturdy.

Maybe some parts of the brain affected by the practice of music is also a part of the process of learning other things. Maybe musicians just have access to one other thing that allows them to make the connection between training and ability. At any rate, there's no doubt in my mind that anything approached thoughtfully improves the function of the mind, which directly affects one's learning processes.

 

[zeff]

That's not to say that people who aren't musician aren't disciplined, but most of the more intellectual, thoughtful, and dedicated people I've met in college have been musicians. It's hard to even explain how it helps you, especially if you haven't ever seriously studied music...

I find the musician worship on this thread both arrogant and unwarranted; playing a team sport is the extracurricular activity most conducive to learning skills which help one excel both academically and professionally. Athletes learn discipline and how to cooperate as members of a team, as do musicians, but they also learn how to be assertive, even aggressive when appropriate and necessary. They also learn how to innovate as the situation demands. The musically-inclined people I knew at my snotty Eastern University, by contrast, tended to be passive, even submissive, as well as less imaginative, even derivative.

Whatever stereotypes prevail, the tailback who learns a complex draw play does so via memorizing the strategy in the film room; practicing the play with his teammates ad nauseum; and spending long hours exercising and lifting weights to be physically able to execute the play. On game day, he must put it all together to execute the play (one of hundreds he will know). Beyond this, he is expected to integrate, on the fly, information from his coaching staff and lineman about what blocking schemes are working and where holes are opening along the defensive line. And even so, after all this, three seconds into the play he will be expected to come up with a new plan, instantaneously, if his lead blocker stumbles and changes the entire composition of the play.

A team sport athlete masters cooperation, tempered by assertiveness, and discipline, enriched by creativity. This strikes me as the appropriate mix of qualities for the successful physician, as well.

 

[sirus_virus]

I rap, does that count?

 

[mlle3000]

Try Tulane...they love people who can play instruments.

i second this.....you are guarenteed to get the "do you play any type of musical instrument?" question at least once during your interviews. so apparently, the adcom at tulane thinks it helps...

 

[anteater14]

It really makes sense to me that persistence and repetition are the keys to facilitating ease and ensuring learning. It's common sense how this would apply to any other aspect of training:

Whatever, I'll say it.
I think perhaps the discipline needed in being a musician probably carries over into other aspects of life. 😀

I agree! We achieve good tone, build our chops, and improve technique through diligent practice - much like academics, sports, etc.

Anyway, I just wanted to add how being a musician affected my apps. A good chunk of my application was related to music. The theme of my personal statement was about my involvement in band through high school and college, and it was also in my ECs.

This definitely came up during my interviews- one of the MDs that interviewed me was also a trombonist, and another was an avid fan of jazz. It definitely made those interviews a lot more comfortable!

I don't think music specifically helped my application, I think it was that I was passionate about something and very honest about how I felt it would affect my career in medicine. It obviously can apply to anything you have a passion for. My point is, if you are a musician, don't need to suppress it on your apps, it shows who you are.

 

[ds3489]

Athletes learn discipline and how to cooperate as members of a team, as do musicians, but they also learn how to be assertive, even aggressive when appropriate and necessary. They also learn how to innovate as the situation demands. The musically-inclined people I knew at my snotty Eastern University, by contrast, tended to be passive, even submissive, as well as less imaginative, even derivative.
A team sport athlete masters cooperation, tempered by assertiveness, and discipline, enriched by creativity. This strikes me as the appropriate mix of qualities for the successful physician, as well.[/quote]

Alright. From the standpoint of a professional musician:

I have been training since I was 4 and was gifted with perfect pitch, etc. I majored in jazz performance, branching from classical. I then continued on to a Master's at New England Conservatory...also if Jazz Performance. Now, I'm switching gears and going for medicine.

As for the athlete/musician comparison, it's valid. My sister played division 1 softball for UMaryland and she and I share very similar thoughts about discipline--I never realized how much we had in common. HOWEVER, that "passive, submissive" comment is not valid in my opinion-your sample size seems to be quite small and I'd stay away from general comments like that. As musicians, specifically jazz, you are expected to lead and listen extremely closely to others for balance in an improvisatory situation. To get gigs, you must be assertive and confident, if not...you will not prevail. Most musicians have to put themselves out there to succeed. I don't mean to start a fight, but I truly think that you can find aspects of anything that will fit the qualities needed to be a good physician.

To answer this original question stated...I don't like math and science too too much. I seem to do alright in them, perhaps b/c of memorization, but I don't do any better in history and english. It's just straight across the board. I did enjoy being a part of a study that involved pianists and dexterity, in hopes to help with patients after a stroke 🙂

 

[southpawcannon]

I find the musician worship on this thread both arrogant and unwarranted; playing a team sport is the extracurricular activity most conducive to learning skills which help one excel both academically and professionally. Athletes learn discipline and how to cooperate as members of a team, as do musicians, but they also learn how to be assertive, even aggressive when appropriate and necessary. They also learn how to innovate as the situation demands. The musically-inclined people I knew at my snotty Eastern University, by contrast, tended to be passive, even submissive, as well as less imaginative, even derivative.

Whatever stereotypes prevail, the tailback who learns a complex draw play does so via memorizing the strategy in the film room; practicing the play with his teammates ad nauseum; and spending long hours exercising and lifting weights to be physically able to execute the play. On game day, he must put it all together to execute the play (one of hundreds he will know). Beyond this, he is expected to integrate, on the fly, information from his coaching staff and lineman about what blocking schemes are working and where holes are opening along the defensive line. And even so, after all this, three seconds into the play he will be expected to come up with a new plan, instantaneously, if his lead blocker stumbles and changes the entire composition of the play.

A team sport athlete masters cooperation, tempered by assertiveness, and discipline, enriched by creativity. This strikes me as the appropriate mix of qualities for the successful physician, as well.

If you smelllll what The Jock is cookin'!"

 

[zeff]

Alright. From the standpoint of a professional musician:

I have been training since I was 4 and was gifted with perfect pitch, etc. I majored in jazz performance, branching from classical. I then continued on to a Master's at New England Conservatory...also if Jazz Performance. Now, I'm switching gears and going for medicine.

As for the athlete/musician comparison, it's valid. My sister played division 1 softball for UMaryland and she and I share very similar thoughts about discipline--I never realized how much we had in common. HOWEVER, that "passive, submissive" comment is not valid in my opinion-your sample size seems to be quite small and I'd stay away from general comments like that. As musicians, specifically jazz, you are expected to lead and listen extremely closely to others for balance in an improvisatory situation. To get gigs, you must be assertive and confident, if not...you will not prevail. Most musicians have to put themselves out there to succeed. I don't mean to start a fight, but I truly think that you can find aspects of anything that will fit the qualities needed to be a good physician.

you're right, I overstated my case, I was in a foul mood this morning; I apologize.

 

[LizzyM]

A paper published in the April 2007 issue of Nature Neuroscience provided some evidence that musical training enhances the brainstems sensitivity to speech sound. This may make it easier to learn tonal languages -- not sure if it has a relationship to math & science.

 

[curlywurly]

I know that I would not be the person I am today if I had not been as involved in music as I have been. I played piano for 7 years and have played flute for 8, and I really feel that music has helped me develop both as a student and as a person. That's not to say that someone who is not musically inclined cannot be good at math or science, but I think that learning music at an early age can give one a boost and an insight into memorization, etc. Music is a great hobby and everyone should get the opportunity to be involved in music in some way.

 

[dln72183]

I know that for me, the day just doesn't feel started-off right if before my first class I haven't gone through my morning practice routine. It gets my mind out of dreary morning mode and right into focus.

There's a lot of careful timing and deliberateness that goes into it as well as emotion and muscle memory; for me, it usually ends up being both cathartic and coordinating (fingers, breathing, eyes, and thoughts). I think it's a sure-fire way to get your mind going, but I don't doubt there are other equally effective ways to get that jump-start.

One thing that I think it gave me was a very concrete way to evaluate on my own my capacity for improvement. Every morning, I set my metronome for the day's tempo a little faster than last week's, and usually the change goes off without much of a hitch. With practice, I eventually make it so that every nuance and placement is exactly how I want it. In the sense of simply going through the motions, I am doing the exact same thing I do every other day, except gradually increasing speed. Time is my measure of improvement.

There's a big difference in the quality of my performance when I decide to skip my tempo too great of a distance -- a lot of my concentration goes to where my fingers should go and what note I should be playing to the detriment of every other aspect and the ease is gone. But with a gradual build up, the difficulty disappears and eventually I become twice as fast as I was at one point with the same amount of mental effort.

From watching other musicians much better/more practiced than I am, I am amazed by their ability. They can on sight read something that I'd spent hours on more musically and adeptly than I had been able to by that point. It's discouraging to think that it's because they're simply naturally better than you that they were able to do it -- the truth is that eventually the patterns of notes become second nature and all music is just more patterns, differently arranged.

It really makes sense to me that persistence and repetition are the keys to facilitating ease and ensuring learning. It's common sense how this would apply to any other aspect of training: the best way to learn math is to work out problems; to learn a language, you use your words. What this kind of tangible first hand knowledge does is eliminate any doubt that even if things aren't easy right away, there is no limit to your potential ability if only you apply methods of studying that are conducive to explicit learning.

Eventually, everything gets easier -- with strong foundations of knowledge, connections between novel material and pertinent things learned prior are that much more available and much more sturdy.

Maybe some parts of the brain affected by the practice of music is also a part of the process of learning other things. Maybe musicians just have access to one other thing that allows them to make the connection between training and ability. At any rate, there's no doubt in my mind that anything approached thoughtfully improves the function of the mind, which directly affects one's learning processes.

HA, I read this at first and it sounded like you were talking about masturbating. But then I read on, and it still sounds like it. Just replace the words in the last paragraph. That's great. I never though of using a metronome. 😆

That being said.... I need to go practice my "instrument"....

 

[Pinkertinkle]

HA, I read this at first and it sounded like you were talking about masturbating. But then I read on, and it still sounds like it. Just replace the words in the last paragraph. That's great. I never though of using a metronome. 😆

That being said.... I need to go practice my "instrument"....

hhahaha Nice

But anyone I think you're better off science inclined than music inclined. There's no music on the USMLE.

 

[circumspect]

HA, I read this at first and it sounded like you were talking about masturbating. But then I read on, and it still sounds like it. Just replace the words in the last paragraph. That's great. I never though of using a metronome. 😆

That being said.... I need to go practice my "instrument"....

Honestly, I was considering using the masturbation analogy but decided against it. 😳 ... 'stimulating.

 

[dln72183]

but seriously, I do understand and to some degree agree with the correlation. However, you can just as easily have a musical genius who blows at other stuff. Like you say, it takes discipline to be a musician. practice and hard work. Both of those are things that would help somebody excel in math and sciences. But they would also help you succeed in a lot of other things.

I guess I don't necessarily believe it give you the aptitude to more easily comprehend differential equations and such.

And in the reveres, I know many people who are crazy math whizzes but couldn't' do a thing with an instrument if they tried.

But it never hurts to have hobbies and schools love people with unique interests and excellent abilities.

 

[dln72183]

Honestly, I was considering using the masturbation analogy but decided against it. 😳 ... 'stimulating.

well, it shows. That made my day. 🙂 Thanks for the laugh. no hard feelings. I understood what you were saying.

 

[biobossx99]

I wanna throw this back at you: Do you think people who are successful in science, apt in the music arts? I don't know why it's a one way translation.

I'm a science-y kind of guy. I love guitar.

Then again, I think anyone can do anything if the right amount of focus and thought is put into anything.

Allen

Typo. My bad. The musically-inclined medical student

I know a majority here haven't started med school yet, but just wanted to get your opinion on the subject. Do you think being musically-inclined correlates to an increased aptitude in the sciences and subsequent success as a medical student and beyond? I.e. you've played an instrument for several years, you understand theory, you went to band camp, etc. Note: I'm not at all dismissing those musically-uninclined as being inferior.

 

[SunshineNYC]

I do a lot with music and everyone in my life is heavily involved in music and I don't see any correlation or connection. Maybe a correlation exists in your life, but not in mine... there would have to be a comprehensive study to really figure it out. I've heard that music is connected to math, but then again, I've not seen any evidence that being good at music has anything to do with being good at math and vice versa. Just anecdotal evidence though .

 

[SketchLazy]

Typo. My bad. The musically-inclined medical student

I know a majority here haven't started med school yet, but just wanted to get your opinion on the subject. Do you think being musically-inclined correlates to an increased aptitude in the sciences and subsequent success as a medical student and beyond? I.e. you've played an instrument for several years, you understand theory, you went to band camp, etc. Note: I'm not at all dismissing those musically-uninclined as being inferior.

I don't know about whether music makes a med student any better, but I do think there is a correlation between playing an instrument and memory. I mean playing one song is like hundreds of notes, so if you already don't have a good memory, it forces you to figure out shortcuts and systems of memorization

 

[jp235145]

Every student in the top ten of my class played an instrument, including myself. I think it really does help.

 

[MusicalDoc]

Thanks, southpawcannon, for starting this very interesting thread! I have to agree with many of you who fail to see a STRONG DIRECT correlation between music and academics (specifically, that of medicine). This is coming from someone who has been considered "musically inclined" all of her life, even before commencing formal musical training -- I haven't had the discipline to stick to one specific instrument (though piano has always been my principal instrument, I can pretty much handle any instrument) to have "mastered" it to the degree of, say, Martha Argerich (hehe...not even close! 😉 ), but I have a profound "appreciation for" and "understanding of" any piece of music, if that makes any sense at all...

Certainly, one can reasonably argue for the parallels between music and language (the "syntax" of music, although it is less obvious what the "semantics" of music are), and the positive "effects" of music on such concepts as math have been suggested (I have personally worked with the individual who had proposed this idea -- all I can say is that we did not see eye to eye on many many many issues, including methodological ones...). Despite all of this, I, too, fail to see a correlation between music and academics (sorry to say but, in my honest opinion, the only people who strongly push for such concepts are those involved in music education...more funds for their cause!!!!!)...

I strongly suspect that whatever relationship one sees has a lot to do with one's ability to focus and attend to the given task, the willingness/motivation and the patience to "master" it -- it is the level of drive that permits one to perform well in any discipline, whether it be the arts or the sciences. Medicine is a unique discipline in that it marries the two -- actually, one can potentially argue that there's a component of the sciences in the arts, and vice versa...sorry to diverge...

At any rate, going back to the OP's question...whether "being musically-inclined correlates to an increased aptitude in the sciences and subsequent success as a medical student and beyond," there's no little in my mind that there's some kind correlation between the two, albeit very very weak. Although I'm not a medical student (yet), I did fairly well in undergrad (music, psych -- did much much better in psych, though!), grad (science), and pre-med post-bacc (my GPA here was the highest of the three), did alright on the science sections on the MCAT (not stellar, by any means), but cannot, for the life of me, do even average on the Verbal (not an excuse at all, but English is my second language)... I've had a couple of interviews many many moons ago, during both of which my involvement in music dominated the conversation, but ended up not being admitted ultimately (shoot, I should've applied to Tulane! 😛 Too late, now...) -- now looking seriouly into med school in the Carib (U.S. DO definitely a possibility, if I could just convince myself that I will proudly incorporate and utilize the OMM in my practice...)...

Sorry I diverged again...anyway, as many of you pointed out before me, I believe that one needs discipline in order to succeed in any discipline (haha...redundancy department of redundancy!) and the patience and drive to hone your skills to master it; both the arts and the sciences require that, IMHO, and that certainly holds true for medicine.