Listening to music and increasing reading achievement scores in vocabulary and comprehension and total reading ability

This study was conducted to investigate the effects of four different auditory background conditions on the reading achievement of mixed ability seventh grade students. 170 seventh grade students from a school district in Berks County Pennsylvania participated in the study. The Gates-MacGinitie Reading Test was administered to obtain the reading scores that were the dependent measure of reading achievement. A researcher-constructed survey was also administered to gain information regarding the amount of time the students spent reading outside of the classroom and the amount of time they were involved with musical training. A researcher-constructed questionnaire was also implemented to gain access to the students' thoughts and feelings regarding the different musical conditions they listened to while they were reading.;The students in this study were randomly assigned to four conditions including a control group and three auditory conditions. Every student participated in each of the three instrumental musical auditory background conditions. The three auditory conditions implemented included the instrumental music of Mozart, the instrumental music of Yanni, an instrumental version of Pink Floyd, and the control condition was that of silence. Students read self-selected independent reading novels thirty minutes each day, for ten consecutive days, while being exposed to one of the four auditory conditions.;There were four different treatment sessions and the students rotated through all four conditions using a counterbalanced method during the experiment. Each session lasted for ten days and included a thirty-minute per day reading period with a selected auditory condition. The Gates-MacGinitie Reading Test was administered as a pre-test and then again as a post-test at the conclusion of each treatment phase. The scores were analyzed by implementing the repeated measures ANOVA statistical testing procedures.;The results of this study support the incorporation of certain types of auditory background conditions into the learning environment. A significant effect was found for vocabulary, comprehension and total reading ability when the auditory background condition consisted of either listening to the instrumental music of Mozart or the auditory condition of silence.