Claire Howlin 🎶🧠

Delighted to be awarded a New Foundations grant from @researchireland.bsky.social with #Neurodiversity Ireland to explore neurodivergent people’s experience of music and arts events We’re going to use Photovoice to see things from a whole new perspective 😅✨🤹🏻‍♂️🎪🎷 #musicscience #inclusivetrinity

Exciting to see the next edition of ICMPC has been announced! #musicscience #conference

New >100-author preprint led by @zixuanjia.bsky.social @yutoozaki.bsky.social and @danya-pav.bsky.social is IMO our most important yet. TLDR: music is not "useless" "auditory cheesecake" - across 901 participants speaking 30 languages, singing bonds us together >1.5x more than speaking. osf.io/pv3m9

‼️ APSCOM/AMPS 2026 Conference Early Bird Registration‼️ Don't forget early bird registration closes next Wednesday on 1st July 2026! 🐦 Registrations are now open for in-person and online attendance. Register now: amps.org.au/conference-r...

We are hiring! PhD student in Cognitive Computational Neuroscience at the Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen, investigating the neural mechanisms of auditory imagination: jobportal.ku.dk/phd/?show=16... Project summary here: lundbeckfonden.com/neuronal-mec... Deadline: July 1st.

Who creates meaning in music? I've reviewed Janet Bourne's new book Who Listens? A fascinating exploration of how musical meaning emerges through the experiences, identities, and cultures we bring to listening. For music cognition, narrative, & music therapy. journals.qmu.ac.uk/approaches/a...

AOC: This is what drinking water in Georgia looks like after Meta began data center construction in the community.

Follow our Cochrane Review on the effects of Music-Based Interventions (MBIs) for chronic pain management. Shared first authorship with Claire Howlin @dancingresearch.bsky.social Thanks to all co-authors! www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.... @musicinthebrain.bsky.social @au.dk

Excited to share we have a new Cochrane Protocol published today! Music‐based interventions for chronic pain management - Howlin C, Pando-Naude, V - 2026 | Cochrane Library www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.... #music #pain #painmanagement @ucdpsychology.bsky.social

We spent some time at the recent Embodied Minds Summit at UCLA discussing the need for 'self' in modelling decision processes. But further work is needed to include rules/goals/rewards which are interoceptively driven In other words, for AI learning the self also needs a body!

Today is official publication day for the paperback of A TRICK OF THE MIND. Surreal as ever to see on the shelves (this time thanks to Waterstones Gower St for indulging me). More here: www.penguin.co.uk/books/451515...

Please repost: I have 3 @erc.europa.eu funded positions available on the neurocognitive decision architecture underpinning use/rejection of coercive interrogation practices using #fNIRS #hyperscanning and naturalistic #cognition #psychskyence #neuroskyence details via my.corehr.com/pls/trrecrui...

Is audience behaviour at concerts getting worse? Dr Claire Howlin from UCD Psychology joined Newstalk’s Lunchtime Live to discuss the psychology behind crowd behaviour at live shows following reports that a record was thrown at Eric Clapton. Listen from 1hr 45mins: bit.ly/4d9l433

Can’t believe it’s the season for #lilyofthevalley again already.. but the big lilies are really stealing the show this year after all the rain #garden #flowers

And we’re off, great keynote speech from Marcus Pearce highlighting how the idyom model can be used to model cultural differences in music perception and pleasure. #musicscience #idyom #cambridge #sempre

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MUSIC AND SLEEP Updated Conference Programme 🎶 The definitive programme for the 1st #ConfMusSleep is now live: musicinthebrain.au.dk/internationa.... Check details on keynotes, workshops, presentations & social events. See you in Aarhus! ✨ #musicscience

🚨 Post-doc Job ALERT! Interested in using AI to better understand how the brain enjoys music? Or how auditory processing changes in Hearing Loss? Want to eat your weight in 🥖, 🧀, and 🍷? Click on this! #neurojobs, #blackinneuro, #neuroskyence, #psychjobs research.pasteur.fr/en/job/postd...

#MusicScience Conference Opportunity 🎶🧠 🎶 2026 AMPS/APSCOM | Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia [hybrid] | 9-11 December 2026 🎤 Deadline for abstracts due 24 April 2026 🎟 Registration open now: amps.org.au/conference-r... 🌐 amps.org.au/amps-apscom-...

Leverhulme Early Career Fellow @curwen01.bsky.social’s project @durham.ac.uk challenges and expands current models of music cognition and explores how music and synaesthesia shape our imagination and creativity.

Only in Dublin…

Join us in Durham on 28th April for a 1-day event exploring dancing across different disciplines, forms, spaces and communities. The day will explore the links between dance, literature, geography, health, and more! Tickets are free but limited 🕺 www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/dancing-ac... #AcademicSky

We’d a Great time at Gorillaz mountain tour this evening - staging was unreal. House was packed, everyone singing like crazy, so many musicians on the stage. Everything from grunge to disco - And never more needed 🤘 🪩 🕺🏻 🎸 #Gorillaz #TimeToDance #HappyEaster

Delighted to catch up with Saoirse Finn during her research visit to Dublin - in line with her talk on genetics, arts and wellbeing we went to visit the #DNA helical structure sculpture in the National botanical gardens 🧬 🌺 🌲 🌞 #botanics #leisure #health

Why does live music hit different? Our new paper has a neural answer: EEG in a concert hall showed stronger brain-rhythm phase locking during live vs. recorded Bach violin — and that predicts higher pleasure & engagement. 1/2

It’s SPRING! And the blossoms are out #flowers #spring #dublin

Well done to Georgina Coyle who set up the second showing of our Photovoice Exhibition at the Neuroconvergence event @ucddublin.bsky.social The event show cased artwork from 14 neurodivergent individuals, which highlighted how #music and #arts can be used to support #neurodivergence.

🚨 #AMPlify2026 March Seminar: So… Can I Use AI for That? Ethical and Practical AI Use in Music Psychology Research with Dr. Solange Glasser 🗓When: Wednesday 11 March, 4-5pm AEDT 🌐Where: Via Zoom 💻Link to register: www.eventbrite.com.au/e/amplify-20...

Looking forward to it!

Today we’re launching the website and social media pages for the new Music Cognition Lab from Dublin, Ireland! Stay tuned for #Music #Cognition updates 🎶🧠🎶🎉 @escom.bsky.social @creativebrainweek.bsky.social @sas.upenn.edu @ausmuspsysoc.bsky.social @musicperception.bsky.social #musicpsychology

Delighted to share our new lab page from the Music Cognition Lab! We have lot's of events and research projects coming up, so you can stay updated here! #MusicPsychology

Looking forward to Creative Brain Week, I’ll be speaking on Wednesday in RIAM on some psychology experiments on #music and #pain @ria.ie #musicscience #creative

We aren't kidding when we say that we book out early. Friday 6th March is ALREADY BOOKED OUT and the rest is going quickly. www.creativebrainweek.com Get your place booked! (Join the waiting list for Friday 6th if you are an optimist - sometimes we get returns).

"Babies can categorise objects at two months" - Listen to Professor Rhodri Cusack discuss with RTÉ this exciting new research being done at the Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience (TCIN). Listen below: https://ow.ly/fYnZ50Yc7NN TrinityNeuroscience

Love this, Shame it’s underpowered but delighted to see the use of a low-latency audio platform for a music group. This has been one of the biggest short comings in online music therapy- which has exploded post COVID. Hopefully there will be a follow up study.. doi.org/10.1177/2059...

Excited to announce our article has been published! doi.org/10.1177/2059... I led a project to operationalise constructs that identify the emotional episodes people experience listening to music. #MusicScience experts assessed items against prior theory, a surprisingly under reported practice 🔭❗

What’s in your head while you listen to music? Share your thoughts as you listen to music during a 40-minute survey we are running @durhammusicdept.bsky.social from the 18-20th February. Sign up at www.signupgenius.com/go/10C044EA5... to book your preferred time slot. #MusicScience

"In 6,700 tests, the bot managed to pass standard 'attention check' questions (which are designed to catch inattentive humans and simple bots) 99.8% of the time." www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Love this. “Spontaneous” has always really meant “we don’t know why X is happening”, a perspective tied to the dominance of structured task paradigms for studying cognition, behavior, and brain activity.

Wonderful! I was watching a documentary about the 60’s and 70’s and was struck how integral music was to the revolution against Nixon, Vietnam, and Civil Rights. Music is power.

I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free

Last week to submit abstracts to join our group in Durham in July for the SysMus26 conference! Please share with any interested #musicscience students! musicscience.net/events/sysmu...

www.rte.ie/entertainmen...

Slow Research, yes, but not boring!

2026 is off to a great start! 🎉 Excited to share my new open-access publication in @plosone.org! 🎶 This study examines how our sense of self (self-construal) influences the pleasure (musical reward) we get from listening to our favourite music. Read it here: doi.org/10.1371/jour...

Reminder: Apply or Nominate someone for the 2026 SfNC Awards! Deadline - Feb. 1st ⏰ SfNC is proud to offer three annual awards recognizing outstanding contributions to creativity research. Winners receive a cash prize and are invited to present their work. Details here: www.tsfnc.org/sfnc-awards

Sometimes I remember that I have a bluesky account ;) I'm very happy to share our last paper, investigating how cognitive skills relate to different levels of musical expertise: url: royalsocietypublishing.org/rsos/article... @cesarflima.bsky.social @masssimo006.bsky.social

AI slop is everywhere in scientific publishing, we’re only catching the easy-to-detect stuff (like when you happen to peer review a manuscript with a AI-hallucinated reference of a paper you apparently wrote) www.theatlantic.com/science/2026...

#MusicScience AND #NeuroJobs, together at last! I can personally recommend several excellent chocolateries nearby: www.fens.org/careers/job-...

Music plays an important role in relationships, especially in the early stages. It can help people express identity, share emotions and bond. But how does music contribute to romantic love at different stages of a relationship? Read more: doi.org/10.12688/ope... #MusicScience #MusicSky