A new scientific study claims to have located the part of the brain which allow us to enjoy music. 

Investigation has previously shown that the pleasure we derive from music – like that derived from food, drugs or sex – is linked to levels of dopamine, the brain’s ‘reward chemical’. New research work, published in Science, has offered more insight into the way we process and enjoy our tunes of choice.

Researchers at Montreal’s McGill University claim to have located the part of the brain where the pleasure we gain from music originates. The project saw 20 volunteers undergo brain scans whilst sampling 30 second clips of songs they hadn’t heard before on a computer interface. Subjects were then asked how much they would spend on buying each track – nothing, 99c, $1.29 or $2. Tracks which people claimed they would pay the most for elicited the strongest response in the nucleus accumbens, aka the “reward processing” centre of the brain.

According to researcher Valorie Salimpoor, the nucleus accumbens is “important because it’s involved in forming expectations and these are expectations that could be rewarding. What makes music so emotionally powerful is the creation of expectation. Activity in the nucleus accumbens normally would indicate that expectations are being met or surpassed.”

Raised activity was also noted in the superior temporal gyrus, which, according to Salimpoor, acts as a sort of internal last.fm: “This part of the brain is the part that has stored all the templates of the music we’ve heard in the past and will be unique for each individuals. The way that we like music is 100% unique to who we are and what we’ve heard in the past and the way that our superior temporal gyrus has been shaped. The brain is working a bit like a music-recommendation system.” [via The Guardian]