[Lewis Allsop] Hello and welcome this is 'For a Better Tomorrow' the University of Derby's Innovation and Research podcast I'm Lewis Allsop and in every episode, I chat to someone in Academia about what they're working on and how it'll make our lives better. Now in previous episodes, we've spoken to researchers answering questions like how analysis of events from the past can inform our current decision-making and how proteins can help combat the onset of Alzheimer's but today I want to talk to you about singing.
Now I think I'll be probably lying to you if I told you I wasn't partial to you know belting out the odd Whitney Houston tune while I'm in the shower and I'm sure you are too. But why does singing make us feel so good how is it good for us? To help us find out I'm joined today by Dr Yoon Irons, who's an Associate Professor of Arts for Health and Well-being at the University of Derby.
It's lovely to see you. Before we get into all of that and have a bit of a sing-song just tell me a bit about you first of all.
[Yoon Irons] I was born and grew up in South Korea and I always loved music and luckily thanks to my parents I had loads of opportunities to learn music and so I learned to play the piano, flute and I learned to sing. It's a bit of a personal story but so I was a very shy child, but I felt through singing even from an early age, I felt through singing I can express what I was feeling and I felt singing was quite therapeutic for me. And I think that's that sort of became my passion and you know, to explore more of our singing. So after graduating with an art degree in South Korea and University, I went to Germany to study music therapy.
[Lewis Allsop] That's what I sort of wanted to talk to you a bit about today because obviously now you're in the UK at the University of Derby. Talk to me about what you're looking into with your research at the moment.
[Yoon Irons] At the moment, yeah I've just finished a big mental health project which was funded by UKRI research fund through something called March Mental Health Network. So in this mental health project, I looked at how we could make ever-so-popular singing groups or community choir groups more mental health inclusive. So, I realised that most choir leaders or singing group leaders they're not, they're coming from sort of music school or teaching music background but they don't know about how to use singing or choir to benefit our Mental Health. So my project looked at how do we develop some guidelines, toolkits for our singing leaders and choir leaders to apply in their practice.
[Lewis Allsop] Because not everyone's Adele, we can't all sing perfectly in tune. But I suppose it's not really about that it's more about feeling good because is there a link between singing and feeling good?
[Yoon Irons] Exactly yes. So singing is actually, uh whole body experience or activity. When you sing so you breathe deeper and you hold your breath much longer than in speaking you would do. And also when you sing our brain produces those all sorts of beneficial neurotransmitters, namely oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin all those things. So oxytocin that makes you feel happy and also close to other people, yeah. Oxytocin also, we produce oxytocin when mothers feed babies yeah. When you sing your brain produces a range of these beneficial neurotransmitters so therefore we feel uplifted, we feel motivated, we feel happy even though we sing sad songs we feel somehow satisfied or validated
[Lewis Allsop] So it's a chemical reaction I suppose isn't it?
[Yoon Irons] Indeed.
[Lewis Allsop] Does it matter if you're singing on your own if you're singing in a group, does it make a difference?
[Yoon Irons] Yeah so, there are some differences in that when you sing with a group, you experience these extra social benefits. So you feel close to other people you feel belonging, you feel part of the group. And also a lot of our participants told me that, and myself I know from my experience singing in choirs, well you make friendships easily in a group, in choir especially, and so these things what kind of social benefits, making friends, maintaining friendship, that happens through choir, through group singing. But when you sing along, that also is good for you as I said it gives you aerobic exercise, your brains still probably produce all those neurotransmitters but you won't necessarily get these social benefits.
[Lewis Allsop] I must say, I always feel better after a bit of a sing-song in the shower.
[Yoon Irons] Exactly yeah I know a lot of people say that yeah. Yeah you still it's experience some kind of uplifting, yeah happy you expressed yourself.
[Lewis Allsop] So let's talk about singing in groups. What are you trying to understand about that and like you say about how choirs and choir leaders in particular I suppose, can help to understand people's mental health and actually to improve it?
[Yoon Irons] Yeah so with our project, we developed this toolkit to help support choir leaders, singing group facilitators to promote better Mental Health. By applying this set of guidelines, set of skills, set of knowledge.
[Lewis Allsop] So when you speak about these guidelines, what sort of things are in this sort of list?
[Yoon Irons] Yeah, so may I invite you to check out the webs our website called singingsidebyside.co.uk Yeah, so we developed these guidelines, and toolkits through working with experienced singing leaders and also mental health expert psychologists. Our guideline applies to the NHS and those five ways to well-being. So there are five ways to promote our well-being, mental well-being and these are:
Connect with other people
Be active
Take notice so taking notice of your feeling or taking notice of how other people are doing
Taking notice of changing color of trees
And learning keep learning yeah
And the last one is give
So through group singing, you can achieve these five ways of to mental well-being quite easily and in this toolkit, we articulated how to address these five things through group singing activities.
[Lewis Allsop] I suppose singing's one of those things that unless you do it professionally you don't think about it very often but actually we probably all do it every day. I suppose in this podcast we're looking at how you know University Research can help normal run-of-the-mill people in their daily lives and actually just having a bit of a sing-song with your mates can make you feel better.
[Yoon Irons] Yeah yeah. Yes indeed so my other current research is look is helping people living with Parkinson's through singing in particular. Because Parkinson's is a neurodegenerative condition that affects all kind of movement in your body so something like speech or speaking involves lots of muscle movement muscle activities yeah. So people with Parkinson's will experience difficulties with speaking and really the basic needs of communicating with other people and in my research, we found that group singing can help them in terms of improving their communication, their speaking, as well as their mental health. So that's my passion for helping old adults living with Parkinson, a very very difficult condition.
[Lewis Allsop] And when you speak about, obviously Parkinson's like you say it is a difficult condition for people to come to terms with, maybe not necessarily just the person who's suffering physically from the condition but the people around them as well. So can singing help those people as well you know, the wider group that this condition can affect.
[Yoon Irons] Yeah very good question. So in our research, we found that the carers are often their spouses or Partners, they come along to our singing sessions and they found that they can have really good time with their partners when they're singing. And also, in their own time they started singing more because through singing they can communicate more. So the person with Parkinson's will have difficulty to express their needs but once there is a song, they can sing those words clearly and that comes quite easy for them that because music, the song has rhythm and melody and those lyrics, so the rhythm helps our brain to organize those necessary movements to make a sound and so when we are singing a song, especially in people with Parkinson's they can easily put these words together without them thinking hard or trying hard. So you know and it's it becomes it's always enjoyable exercise too for them.
[Lewis Allsop] It is, isn't it? My uncle's got a stutter and one of the ways that he deals with it is with tapping and that's all to do with the rhythm as well I suppose, isn't it? And like you say it's that brain, it's helping your brain to just work everything out.
[Yoon Irons] Yes yes indeed yes so uh it's amazing what rhythm does for us actually but when you think about it our body, uh our body movement, basic movement, walking is rhythmic. You put one foot in front of another foot yeah. So there are a lot of things are kind of rhythmic that we do in everyday life and especially in people with Parkinson's those rhythms can be delayed because due to their Parkinson's because the brain cells they don't communicate each other very well. But once there is music, once there is song, they can tap easily and they can walk easily and they can speak easily, easier.
So yeah back to our participants, the carers, and their partners found it's enjoyable time for them to sing along, sing together and as well as they can communicate better. So I know some stories about they start singing in the car you know on the way to singing or on the way back home, they'll be singing in the car and they feel more connected and they feel better. And as I said, singing all songs you know allow them to share their own memories you know.
Perhaps they used to dance before in the 60s in the 70s and those memories do come back through songs all songs, then you know they really reliving those good times.
[Lewis Allsop] It's really nice and I don't want to put words in your mouth but it must be a nice feeling you know when you see families that have had this horrible condition thrust upon them in one way or another all of a sudden just enjoying themselves again.
[Yoon Irons] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right, so you know when you think about it singing does offer you a range of benefits really, from physical to mental and spiritual benefits - for some singing hymns are very important you see. So you know there isn't such pill or therapy that does everything for you so I have started a campaign called the song a day. It's a bit I still a bit from the saying an apple a day keeps the doctor away. So in line with that, I'm saying a song a day keeps the doctor away so my campaign is called the song a day. So try to sing a song a day for yourself and or with your mate or with your family or even in the shower as you said. You know, doing something good for yourself.
[Lewis Allsop] I'm gonna have a sing-along to the radio in the car on the way I am tonight.
[Yoon Irons] Yeah yeah, exactly yeah.
[Lewis Allsop] Thank you very much for talking to me.
[Yoon Irons] Oh you're very welcome, thank you for having me.
[Lewis Allsop] That is Dr Yoon Irons, who's an Associate Professor of Arts for Health and Well-being here at the University of Derby. And that's it for this episode of For a better tomorrow, the University's Innovation and Research podcast. In other episodes, I've looked into the research answering questions like why inter-business relationships are so important to our daily lives and how we can use computers to help us understand the world. So be sure to check them out wherever you get your podcasts and follow the University @DerbyUni. I'll see you next time, bye.
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[Lewis Allsop] For a better tomorrow was presented by me Lewis Allsop and produced by myself and Dr Daithi McMahon in the School of Arts for the University of Derby.