The Scientific Basis of Musical Therapy between Versatility and Diversity

This short statement is based on the materials of the author's report at the first Asia-Pacific Congress on Music Therapy, organized by the Research Center for Arts Therapies of Beijing Normal University (Beijing, China: September 2019) and addresses the relevance of solving the problem of the universality of the scientific foundations of music therapy, which is actively studied by the fundamental science at the present stage, and at the same time the originality of cultural traditions. In my report, I identified specific goals and objectives that require discussion at the modern level of methodological knowledge:

1. Philosophy of psychotherapy in the aspect of ethno-cultural traditions as a variable system of "default" representations between the strategies of predictability and freedom of creative exits of patients from difficult situations of life and health;
2. Objective general human and subjective-personal prerequisites for the effectiveness of musical psychotherapy from the standpoint of neuroscience and human musical psychology, barriers to its effectiveness from the standpoint of differential musical psychology (taking into account age, cultural, social and personal characteristics);
3. Cross-cultural research of musical impact and methodology of effective music therapy.

I presented in my report the main research results in accordance with the stated goals:

1. Cross-Cultural study of the perception of the “own” and alien music (peculiarities of the recognition of the emotional content of music by Russian and Chinese musician) [1];
2. Development and testing in clinical and educational practice of the musical activity approach in Music therapy [2];
3. Investigation of the possibility of constructing integrative models of music therapy [3].

The presented conclusions allow us to conclude that it is necessary to combine methods of evidence-based scientific effectiveness and subjective indicators based on phenomenological descriptions of anthropological practices of ethnic variants of psychotherapy. Research continues with the grant support of the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (RFBR), project № 19-013-00171.

1. Toropova AV, Knyazeva TS (2017) Perception of music by representatives of different cultures. Questions of Psychology [Voprosii Psychologyi] 1: 116-129.
2. Toropova A, Lvova T (2018) Musical activity therapy as a supplemental method of rehabilitating children with bronchial asthma. Journal of Russian & East European Psychology 55(1): 53-84.
3. Ying F, Toropova AV (2016) Music therapeutic approach to accompanying hyperactive children. Journal Health and Education in the XXI century 7(18): 173-177.