From an athlete’s running pace matching the beat of a song to a lifter listening to motivational music while pumping out reps, music is commonplace in the fitness world. For some, listening to music is a necessity in their workout routine.

“I went to the gym once … and I was so excited, and then I realized I left my AirPods at home midway through the drive so I turned around and got them and came back,” senior Carly Saltzman said.

Saltzman listens to music when she works out at the gym to avoid distractions and to lift her mood, she said.

Talia Lerner, assistant professor of neuroscience at Northwestern University, said in a phone interview that listening to music can be rewarding, which impacts a person’s dopamine levels.

In the human body, dopamine is also heavily involved in movement, Lerner said.

“Dopamine is very important for motor learning, like putting together sequences of movement the way that you would need to if you’re trying to learn to do something that might be initially unfamiliar, like swinging a baseball bat, for example,” Lerner said.

Drake Deitch, post-doctoral psychology fellow at Ascend Consultation in Health Care, said in an email correspondence that another way music influences people when exercising is by impacting mood.

“Music can facilitate calming or elevating the mind based on what is needed in that moment,” Deitch said.

According to senior John Bosacoma, “If I have a more intense workout, then I might listen to more EDM or hip-hop or something that’s a little heavier, whereas if it’s a lighter workout, something less intense, then maybe more peaceful music [and] more instrumental.”

According to Saltzman, music helps her stay motivated during a workout.

“I feel like listening to music can help you stay focused and be in your zone,” Saltzman said.

Listening to music can become a habit when exercising, which can be beneficial but detrimental if that habit is disrupted.

“[When] athletes talk about being in the zone, they probably are more in that habitual mode where they’re just relying on these deeply ingrained habits from hours and hours of practice,” Lerner said.

“It’s advantageous to have built up all these different habits that you can just know you can fall back on,” said Lerner. “But the problem is, what if something disrupts your habit? Like you always listen to a certain song before you go to your gymnastics routine … and then your phone is broken and you don’t have the song with you and you can’t listen to it, then are you going to totally fall apart or have you practiced for that disaster and can you still remember how to perform?”

According to Bosacoma, his lacrosse team does not practice with music.

Before games, many other schools’ lacrosse teams play music which helps get everyone on the Glenbrook North team hyped to play, but the absence of pregame music does not largely affect the team’s performance, Bosacoma said.

“I think it makes less of an impact on lacrosse compared to just when I lift because we’re so used to practicing without music, whereas when I workout I almost always have music so if I don’t have it, then it makes more of a [negative] impact,” Bosacoma said.