Individual Differences in Working Memory Predict the Effect of Music on Student Performance

Past research has demonstrated that music often negatively impacts performance on a variety of cognitive tasks, including academically relevant tasks. There are, however, discrepancies in the literature, including a handful of instances where no effect of music was observed. We tested the novel hypothesis that working-memory capacity moderated the detrimental effect of music on academic performance. Undergraduate students worked on reading-comprehension and math tasks under both music and silence conditions before completing a battery of working-memory capacity assessments. Although music led to a significant decline in performance overall, working-memory capacity moderated this effect in the reading-comprehension tasks. These findings suggest that individuals who are better able to control their attention (as indexed by working-memory capacity) may be protected from music-related distraction when completing certain kinds of academically relevant tasks.