An Emotional Timing: Influencing Patient's Perceived Emotions Using Audio Sensory Cues Through Musical Tempo

Abstract

The purpose of this master thesis is to discover whether the manipulation of musical tempo in an audio track will have an effect on a patient's perceived emotions in a dental practice environment and the role of gender. We investigate this question by conducting an online survey-based experiment based on three musical tempos being slow (60 bpm), medium (100 bpm), and fast (120 bpm) from the same audio track and based on five perceived emotions being tense, excited, calm, relaxed, and nervous. First, we found that slow tempo audio positively enhanced the patient’s emotions (relaxed, calm, excited) while fast tempo audio negatively enhanced the patient’s emotions (tense, nervous). Second, we found that the main effect for gender is statistically significant and males and female respondents have a difference in the level of feeling calm, nervous, excited, tense, or relaxed based on all three audio tempos tested. Finally, the purpose of our thesis was to research if there is a way for a patient’s experience to be improved through the implementation of auditory cues. This improvement in perceived emotions, we believe, will greatly improve a customer’s experience when visiting a dental practice.