Want to preserve your sanity? Get into podcasts! An Australian-American study suggests that listening to it regularly would help to sharpen curiosity, strengthen social ties and even protect against neurosis.
- Listening to Podcasts Regularly Boosts the Brain and Reduces Negative Emotions, According to a New Study
- Research also suggests that listening through headphones increases a sense of intimacy with the presenter.
Led by researchers from Queensland University of Technology (Australia) and Stanford University (USA), this new study published in Plos One suggests that listening to podcasts regularly would promote openness, increase curiosity and even reduce neuroses.
To reach these conclusions, the authors of this work surveyed 306 adults from ten countries about their podcast consumption habits. Participants were also asked to complete a questionnaire in order to communicate information on personality traits (curiosity, open-mindedness, appetite for cognitive effort, need to belong, etc.).
Other criteria such as age, gender, as well as elements relating more to the psychological aspect, such as addiction to smartphones or the practice of mindfulness meditation, were also taken into account.
The podcast, new door to knowledge?
“Overall, the results support the idea that informational motives may play a role in podcast listening, and that certain aspects of listening are associated with positive outcomes.“, observe the researchers. Concretely, this means that listening to podcasts promotes openness to others and to knowledge and reduces negative emotions.
The study also demonstrated that listening to podcasts through headphones increased perceived intimacy with the host or host, increased the desire to learn and was not correlated with addiction to social networks or smartphones. .
“People who listen to podcasts have stronger informational needs. These results are consistent with previous research that has shown that being open-minded, curious, or needing cognitive effort is associated with the use of other new technologies and the use of online platforms in the workplace. purpose of getting informedr”, conclude the researchers.
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