Output hymn to work: what the developers are listening to

Photo Vikramdeep Sidhu / CC (pictured: Audio-Technica ATH-M50x Covering Headphones )

The process of developing and designing is complex and exciting. Thousands of people around the world write, test code, and this work takes a lot of time for many developers. In addition to the skills that each programmer has, the work environment is very important. Everyone achieves this in his own way - some go to work outside or in a cafe, others prefer the office environment, while others do not leave the house.
')
Everyone has their own requirements for the formation of a productive atmosphere. But there is something in our world that unites all people together. Music. After all, there is nothing easier than to turn on suitable music for you and concentrate on work [there are those who cannot work with music, but the talk in this material is not about them].

Quora users shared their views on which music is best suited for coding, and we analyzed their answers and studied the scientific evidence that music is not a hindrance to work.

What is not surprising is the number of proposed options - after all, how many people, so many opinions. Techno, trance, drum and bass, jazz, hip-hop, ambient, post-rock, metal, classic - in favor of each of the genres users gave their arguments.

The most popular option agreed by a large number of users was the answer of Max Levchin , CEO of Affirm and co-founder of Paypal:

“Trance or techno (from 130 bpm and higher): instrumental versions, if there is a vocal, then only in an unfamiliar language. This music supports in tone, and also creates some kind of tension that does not distract from brain activity at all, but only adds more care. ”

In general, many people agree with this answer: what I want to especially note is the paragraph about vocals and instruments. Almost every respondent said that the vocals should be imperceptible, either in an incomprehensible language for the listener or be absent altogether, otherwise at some point you can be distracted by the lyrics, start singing or accidentally type a word from the song, and this is not what is required from the music at work.

Who to listen to from electronic music :

• Four tet
• Bonobo
• Olafur Arnalds
• Trent reznor
• Apex twin
• Flying lotus
• Apparat
• Purity ring

The next most popular genres after electronic music became hip-hop and jazz. Many listeners choose precisely these styles, because they find something of their own in them - a clear and even rhythm or a long improvisation.

Who to listen from jazz :

• Charlie parker
• John coltrane
• Miles Davis
• Thelonious monk

Who to listen from trip-hop / hip-hop :

• J dilla
• Madlib
• Massive attack

Another extremely popular genre, of course, was the classic. Many people pay attention to her because she has been motivating people for many years. The sound here is not real, but classical compositions or especially orchestral performances last for a very long time. This creates an atmosphere of unity with the work, when the music sounds whole and it does not have to be switched every 5 minutes.

Who to listen from classical and orchestral music :

• Bach
• Chopin
• Philip Glass
• Joseph Haydn
• Ludovico Einaudi
• Hans Zimmer
• 2Cellos

Stelon Britto, in his answer, shared not so much his favorite music, but also what he should and should not listen to. So, he recommends listening to what maintains in an active working state, and exactly the kind of music that is relevant at the moment. That is, choose tracks according to your mood. But what you should not do is listen to something new, especially that you have not heard yet, but you really want to get to know something with it.

However, there are listeners who, in contrast to measured, calm and "looped" music, prefer heavy, for example, metal.

“I work in a noisy office, and in order not to hear all this extraneous noise, I purchased expensive headphones, an amplifier and an external sound card. I often listen to metal in which I don’t understand a word. Everything turns into an incomprehensible set of sounds, but sometimes this sound delays. Of course, I'm not the only listener.

But I prefer to listen to music, and not someone else's conversations, which are easily distracted. And at night I generally like to work in silence. ”

Amol Verma speaks with a similar point of view, but he prefers not to listen to metal, but polyrhythmic music - almost all of his playlists have a gentle [this, in fact, is not a style in music, but rather a musical device, although many consider the opposite]. The vocals of the groups using the gentle are mostly growl, and it’s not easy to hear any articulate words [if, of course, you don’t know the lyrics].

Who to listen to from metal / jenta :

• Decapitated
• Agoraphobic
• Nosebleed
• Meshuggah
• TesseracT
• Animals as leaders

In addition to many genres, some users recommend sites where you can listen to music. Among them are the well-known: Soundcloud, Spotify, Mixcloud, where you can find a huge number of mixes for every taste, but I also want to mention another site - musicforprogramming.net . As is clear from the name of the site, it is specifically designed specifically for coding. The site looks like a compiler window, which lists all the mixes and their description.

There are some programmers who prefer to listen not to music, but to the sounds of nature or the noise of the city. Brandon Wirths is one of those people who thinks that such sounds do not affect a person negatively. So, from fast music, breathing can accelerate or the pulse rises, and while listening to the usual sounds of the living world this will not happen.

What to listen to from the sounds of nature:

• rainymood.com
• calm.com

Such music is suitable for any mental activity, so do not think that it is good only for coding. The main thing - to find what you like and fits at the moment. You can also experiment and in parallel with the music mix to include sounds of nature, such as the sound of waves or rain.

Of course, you should not take music as a mandatory and integral element to any activity that will positively contribute to the work. Work can be different - simple and monotonous, and vice versa, difficult and stressful. So, one of the users of the IT resource Stackexchange described the influence of music on his work as follows:

“When I write pseudocode or implement procedures that are clear to me and there is no need to look into the documents to understand how to write them, background music helps me a lot - it sets the rhythm for me, and if the task is too trivial, then the music does not give me get bored.

But when it comes to solving problems or finding a bug, the music distracts me greatly. And, of course, the situation depends on the music. If I know her [music] well and heard it before, I will not concentrate on it. And if I hear music for the first time, I will be distracted and lose precious time. ”

Another user shared his story from the same forum . When at work, in the next room from him, not isolated and sheathed with one drywall, 4 servers were installed, it became very noisy. He bought good headphones with sound insulation, and he had a choice: listen to music when performing simple tasks, ignoring noise, or just sit in headphones without music, as they did not let in outside noises.

From this we can conclude: if you like to listen to music, but sometimes you need to concentrate and sit in complete silence, you can think about good headphones with additional sound insulation. They cost more than usual, but they do not let any noise through - you will be provided with not only sound, but also (if necessary) its absence.

The Jaxenter portal highlighted the main points from Sam Howard's material on why programmers should listen to music:

• Developers sometimes have to solve complex, but repetitive problems, for example, to test the code, and this process is often tedious and boring. Music in this situation will help keep the brain in suspense and prevent the head from disconnecting from overwork.
• Music can be a motivator. If you listen to some epic, “massive” soundtracks while working, they can inspire you to solve more complex problems.
• If you have a stressful atmosphere at work, Claude Debussy’s music will help soften the atmosphere. Fatigue can also be fought by listening to tracks with fast guitar riffs.
• Another nice bonus from listening to music is that you don’t have to be distracted by talking to colleagues when the deadline is tight.

Music and productivity: what science says

According to the results of research by scientists focus @ will, it was revealed that a person, starting to work or study, on average, spends about 20 minutes “acclimatizing” in order to tune and focus. Suitable music helps speed up the process of habituation, and the brain adjusts to work faster.

Another similar study was conducted at the University of Burgundy. The purpose of the experiment was to identify the influence of music on the human brain. The 22 participants were given the task of memorizing as many words as possible (a total of 42 nouns from different areas of the French lexicon were used), as well as information and context related to these words. The participants were in quiet and dark rooms, and in front of them was a computer screen.

Throughout the experiment, acoustic jazz music was periodically included ( If you see my mother - Sidney Bechet). After this experiment, there was another one where participants were shown new words in tandem with the previously presented words.

Participants had to say whether they had seen these words before, and if they had, then indicate in what context. According to the results of this study, it was revealed that people who listened to music memorized words better, unlike those who did not listen to it. There have also been theories about the use of music in the treatment of patients with memory problems, namely the elderly with Alzheimer's disease.

Dozens of similar experiments are conducted annually, which study the characteristics of the brain, the influence of music and the change in productivity when listening to it. Gregory Tsiotti in his article on Fastcompany.com gathered a few examples of these experiments and briefly described their goals and results. Here are some of them:

• Music helps to ease the looped work. In a number of studies, it was proved that music helps to better cope with monotonous work, but this theory also has its opponents. Ideas are being put forward that not music affects productivity, but mood. That is, music affects mood, which in turn affects the effectiveness of actions. It was also found that dissonant music does not affect productivity in any way, while major scales have a positive effect on work.
• In noisy rooms, music is good. According to the results of another experiment, it turned out that the first group of people who listened to music coped with the task assigned to it faster, and the approach to its solution was more effective, unlike the results of the second group.
• Music can negatively affect the learning process. It is much more difficult to memorize new information when there is a foreign stimulus, even if it is music. The participants in the experiment were given more difficult tasks if songs were played at that moment.
• Environmental noise helps to create. The group of people who performed the task under the background noise, approached more creatively to perform their task, rather than those who worked in silence. Scientists also proved that too high, or vice versa, too low frequencies have a negative impact on work.
• Different kinds of music are needed for different activities. For active work, quiet melodies will not work - you will need an “explosive” composition, causing a desire to act.

And at the end I want to share the thoughts of Michael Cho in his article on Medium.com. Mikael talks about how music affects us and why we like it. When a person listens to music, the nucleus accumbens is accepted for work in his head. With its activity, the “hormone of pleasure” begins to stand out in the body - dopamine, which is located in the neurons of the brain in the ventral area.

Dopamine is always released when a person likes what he does - he eats his favorite food, plays a computer game, reads an interesting book. Also, the amount of dopamine entering the body depends on the unpredictability of events. The less we expect a surprise, the more pleasant it will be.

Music unites people and makes them better, whatever they do. This conclusion was made by scientists after an experiment involving children. They were divided into two groups and showed a toy frog. The first group was told that the frog would “wake up” only when everyone would sing and dance, and the second group had to do the same thing, only without the songs.

After this preparatory stage, children were separated in pairs and given in a box with marmalade. When the children took the box, it opened the bottom, and all the marmalade crumbled on the floor. The children who were in the first group — that is, those who sang turned out to be friendlier and together began to collect sprinkled marmalade. In children from the second group, such cooperation was not observed. Truly, music can not only set up productive activities, but also help to act effectively in a difficult situation.

In conclusion, I would like to say that without music, our world would be more scarce, and the whole routine that we perform daily would annoy us even more. Choose for each activity your music, the one that you like at the moment, and your work will play with new colors, and the pleasure of the tasks performed will increase significantly.