Sep 23, 2026 · 32 min · 10 segments
Dr. Dan Bowling is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Stanford School of Medicine and Director of the Music, Brain & Health Lab. His translational research is focused on understanding how music…
Dan BowlingGuest
Sophina McDanielHostSheila Kahn and Sophina McDanielHostI love that you mentioned somebody having chills in context of music they love because that is one of the most common responses we get at our Friday sound baths is people say that they felt inexperienced chills.
And I have the same dilemma that I think about on Friday Sound Baths when you have a large group of people, some patients, some caregivers, some staff, all dealing with different aspects.
And I think, oh, maybe they would want something more invigorating or something more calming.
And so obviously, I'm trying to cast a wide net in how I play so that a piece will resonate with different people.
And it sounds like you're taking that to the next level in terms of personalization.
That you can get that reaction, um, because it's something in the, in the world of music, like it, it often applies to a set of pieces, a set of tracks for an individual.
Um, and you can, there've been experiments where they've been like, okay, uh, are you somebody who gets chills in relation to music? What are the music? What are the tracks that do that? They come in, confirm that they get the chills from that music and then, then study those people when they're having the chills in the brain scanner.
Um, and, really interesting result was that during those chills, like the intensity of those chills and the frequency of those chills is correlated with dopamine release in part of your brain that is a core center of reward.
So that was really the thing that kicked off all of this research and the fact that you can stimulate that with, with sound bath for individuals who've never heard it before in a, in a, you know, in a space in a hospital, like it's really powerful.
You know, we can't say for sure that it's the same mechanism, but, but that would certainly be a strong hypothesis is that you're, you're driving reward circuitry with those sounds systematically.
I love that you mentioned somebody having chills in context of music they love because that is one of the most common responses we get at our Friday sound baths is people say that they felt inexperienced chills.
And I have the same dilemma that I think about on Friday Sound Baths when you have a large group of people, some patients, some caregivers, some staff, all dealing with different aspects.
And I think, oh, maybe they would want something more invigorating or something more calming.
And so obviously, I'm trying to cast a wide net in how I play so that a piece will resonate with different people.
And it sounds like you're taking that to the next level in terms of personalization.
That you can get that reaction, um, because it's something in the, in the world of music, like it, it often applies to a set of pieces, a set of tracks for an individual.
Um, and you can, there've been experiments where they've been like, okay, uh, are you somebody who gets chills in relation to music? What are the music? What are the tracks that do that? They come in, confirm that they get the chills from that music and then, then study those people when they're having the chills in the brain scanner.
Um, and, really interesting result was that during those chills, like the intensity of those chills and the frequency of those chills is correlated with dopamine release in part of your brain that is a core center of reward.
So that was really the thing that kicked off all of this research and the fact that you can stimulate that with, with sound bath for individuals who've never heard it before in a, in a, you know, in a space in a hospital, like it's really powerful.
You know, we can't say for sure that it's the same mechanism, but, but that would certainly be a strong hypothesis is that you're, you're driving reward circuitry with those sounds systematically.
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