The healing power of music for mental health has been formally studied across many professions – from psychology to music therapy to nursing – dating back to the 1940s. A recent global scoping review evaluated published research on music-related interventions for serious mental health issues and underscored their therapeutic potential of music to support mental […]

Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson, a community planning expert and institute professor at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts and the Watts College of Public Service and Community Solutions at Arizona State University, shares her vision for integrating arts and culture into placemaking as a way to reckon with racial trauma and restore dignity […]

Johns Hopkins Magazine recently profiled the International Arts + Mind Lab (IAM Lab) in the Fall 2019 issue, highlighting its growing body of work in the field of neuroaesthetics—at Hopkins and around the world. IAM Lab executive director Susan Magsamen spoke with Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson about the vision of the lab as a hub of […]

The International Arts + Mind Lab (IAM Lab) of Johns Hopkins University recently teamed up with Drexel University’s College of Nursing and Health Professions (CNHP) on an innovative new study of the therapeutic potential of virtual reality. Led by Girija Kaimal, EdD, assistant professor in CNHP’s Creative Arts Therapies Department, and Susan Magsamen, executive director […]

Music has long been associated with mental, physical, and spiritual health. And someday soon, doctors may start prescribing their patients a dose of music to accompany more conventional medicine. The Johns Hopkins Center for Music and Medicine, an interdepartmental collaboration between the School of Medicine and Peabody Conservatory, is actively exploring the science and therapeutic […]

“Kiss your brain!” It’s a common refrain from teachers at the Building Educated Leaders for Life (BELL) afterschool program when a scholar gives a great answer or pushes himself to new conclusions. After last week, scholars who kiss their hand and touch their forehead in response likely have a whole new appreciation for why their […]

Steven Gross is an Associate Professor at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) Department of Philosophy. He has been a regular participant of the Society for Philosophy and Psychology (SPP) and served as co-organizer of the 43rd annual meeting, as well as the organizer of the pre-conference workshop on cognitive science and aesthetics. The SPP is […]

On May 19, 2017, the Kavli Neuroscience Discovery Institute hosted actor, director, and science advocate Alan Alda. Alan Alda learned the hard way the power of clear scientific communication and connection. While on a trip in remote Chile, he developed excruciating pain in his abdomen. Assuming it was his appendix, he was rushed to the […]

Last month we gathered 16 dynamic scientists, artists and scientists/artists for the first International Arts + Mind Lab Impact-Based Thinking Working Group meeting. For those of you who were able to join us, thank you for a thoughtful and thought-provoking discussion! For those who weren’t, we are excited to share what we discussed and hear […]

Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis is Professor and Director of the Music Cognition Lab at the University of Arkansas. Her research approaches music from the perspective of cognitive science. She is interested in the interface between musical structure and engagement, especially in listeners without formal training, and especially as it occurs dynamically across the course of the […]