Study: BTS and Billie Eilish songs help you fall asleep — but for different reasons than you might think

Lullabies are a widespread musical phenomenon. Streaming, in its sweeping impact on the way music is consumed, should be impacting it too. Scientists at Aarhus University followed this idea and evaluated Spotify playlists that refer to “sleep” via title or description. They also unexpectedly stumbled upon music by Billie Eilish and BTS.

The study

A total of 985 Spotify playlists were evaluated and the more than 225,000 tracks contained were sorted according to specific auditory qualities. Among other things, according to tempo, danceability, their level of acoustic instrumentation and vocality. This sorting revealed six distinct subgroups. Three of them corresponded to the assumption formulated in the study that slow, acoustic and monotonous songs would occur particularly frequently. This includes ambient, lofi and meditation music. The other three groups exhibit characteristics not typically associated with a relaxing effect. They mainly consist of pop songs.

BTS and Billie Eilish

What is particularly striking is that the overall most frequent track within all playlists is BTS’ “Dynamite”. Songs by Billie Eilish also feature prominently in the playlists, including her song with Khalid “Lovely” and “i love you” from her album WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHRE DO WE GO?. Harry Styles’ “Falling” also appears relatively frequently. The scientists suspect that this could be due to the familiarity and catchiness of pop songs. They emphasize that the study shows how subjective and diverse proverbial lullabies can be.

The scientists point out that their study is the first to examine the relationship between music and sleep on such a large scale. The aim is also to gain insights into the therapeutic use of music in further studies.

The whole study is there here.

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