I recently stumbled upon an interesting study that compares students' SAT scores with their favorite music. It breaks down the music by genre, and then by specific bands and musicians. I thought it was intriguing because of how stereotypical it seemed-Beethoven listeners racked up the top scores, while Lil Wayne fans were among the lowest. It also showed the range of scores; more popular musicians tended to have much larger score ranges due to their broad reach.
Basically, the study made wonder: do we like certain music because of our intelligence level, or is our intelligence level affected by the music we listen to? Personally, I think the first seems more logical. People tend to gravitate towards music that resonates with them. It would make sense, then, that people with similar intelligence levels would listen to the same type of music. Of course there are outliers, and I know that correlation does not prove causation, but it does seem like a viable theory.
I think that in some ways, the music you listen to can inhibit your intelligence. I mean, studies support the idea that playing Mozart for your baby will make it smarter (though I don't know how much of that is fact and how much is just people who want to brag about how smart their kid is). I know from personal experience that I enjoyed the Beatles's, Ben Folds's, and Regina Spektor's music long before I even knew that they were the ones who had written it. My favorite song when I was little was "Octopus's Garden" and I only recently found out it was by the Beatles.
In a lot of ways, this study is inconclusive because it doesn't include any information about other factors that go into the type of music people enjoy, such as friends and location. I have to admit, though, that I did a little fist pump when I saw that Sufjan Stevens fans got the second-highest scores.
See the chart
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