The impact of music and movement on executive function in preschool children

Abstract

The purpose of the current research was to investigate the impact of music and movement on executive function skills in preschool children. The total participants were 146 preschool children aged 3 to 5 year olds, using purposive sampling and matching method. The participants were divided into two groups; music and movement group and control group. The music and movement group included 73 children attending kindergarten level 1, 2, and 3 in the school where music and movement was integrated in the main part of the school curriculum and daily routine activities. The control group included 73 children attending kindergarten level 1, 2, and 3 in the school where regular preschool curriculum was used, and music and movement was not used as the main part of preschool curriculum and daily routine activities. The BRIEF-P; the standardized test, was utilized to examine children’s executive function skills in this study. A series of multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) was performed to investigate the mean differences in the subscale scores of the executive functions between the music and movement and control groups and to control extraneous variables, i.e., family background, student background and student activities. The results showed that the preschool children attending the kindergarten level l in music and movement group had significantly lower mean scores on inhibition, shifting, working memory, and emotional control than did the students in the control group (F= 7.813, 10.916, 5.992, and 7.384 respectively, p. <.05) whereas plan/organize was not significant (F=1.359 respectively, p. >.05). The preschool children attending the kindergarten level 2 in the music and movement group had significantly lower mean scores on all subscale skills of the executive function including, inhibition, shifting, emotional control, working memory, and plan/organize than did the students in the control group (F= 4.159, 5.85, 4.334, 12.494, and 12.995 respectively, p. <.05). The preschool children attending the kindergarten level 3 in the music and movement group had significantly lower mean scores on all subscale skills of the executive function including, inhibition, shifting, emotional control, working memory, and plan/organize than the students in the control group (F= 7.327, 8.339, 9.657, 8.773 and 12.523 respectively, p. <.05).The findings suggested the positive impact of music and movement on preschool children' executive function. Discussion, limitations, implications, and suggestions for future research would be presented.