Musical Dissonance and Personality Type

There is a multitude of information on the internet linking musical style preference and personality traits. Most of it is on the association between genre and the Big 5. However, how useful is that?

From this, we get that most people have high self-esteem and are outgoing. So much for providing useful information. Besides how accurate is that? Other researchers grouped genres, categorizing by musical complexity, and have found different results. How they operationalized musical complexity is also of question. Perhaps, looking at more specific musical characteristics such as tempo, tonality, or timbre would tell us more.

Musical dissonance encompasses unstable intervals, chords and harmony that need to be resolved by replacing the dissonant note(s) with consonant ones. What has been considered dissonance and consonance has evolved throughout the history of Western music, and is different cross-culturally. Generally speaking, the past few decades has seen a decline in the amount of dissonance in music, as well as quicker resolutions when it does occur. For example, compared to most 21st century pop songs, Rachmaninoff takes a significantly longer time to resolve dissonance in his pieces. This parallels the state of technological development, with increasingly fast and convenient ways to go about life, which has possibly led to less patience in people. So removing musical training as a confound, could it be possible that people with less patience in general prefer less dissonance in their music?

Future research could look into the link between Type A/B personality and tolerance for musical dissonance. If there is a link between the two, it is possible that Type A personality would be linked to intolerance, and Type B personality linked to tolerance for musical dissonance. Although it is hard to imagine that musical dissonance tolerance/intolerance would cause Type A/B personality, perhaps this might have implications for music therapy.

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