Think of your favorite song at the moment: The one you blast in your AirPods on your snowy trek to class because it makes the cold a bit more bearable. Think of why you like it so much — does it remind you of someone? Maybe it describes a love you long to feel, or captures the heartbreak you never want to feel again. Good music would not exist without romance; that’s a fact. But could romance exist without music?
Charles Darwin, the father of modern evolutionary theory, believed that music in human society arose as a result of sexual selection: When certain traits lead to greater mating success and therefore become amplified in a population over time. As he observed how male birds use their unique trills to attract female attention, he became convinced that people harness their musicality for the purpose of wooing a mate. Music is ubiquitous among every human culture, and the existence of the Neanderthal bone flute proves that humans have been honing their music ability since the dawn of time. Why would early humans devote energy and resources to the act of making music, a pastime that has no observable benefits to hunter-gatherer survival practices? Darwin claims: for sex!
There is no denying that music holds raw power when it comes to love and attraction. Musicians express jubilation, arousal and heartbreak through skillful melodies and lyrics combined perfectly to give you chills. There is even research on how music stimulates the same reward pathways in your brain as sex. I can draw many parallels between how we relate to music and how we relate to each other. Similar to how people have ‘types’ they gravitate towards romantically, it is widely accepted that everyone has a unique taste in music. Some songs, and some people, just ‘do it’ for us. If music is evolutionarily intertwined with sex, as Darwin suggests, then it would make sense that a person’s capacity to appreciate music holds merit in a romantic relationship. It seems to me that, given our highly introspective natures, we would judge a potential partner based on their alignment with our idea of what ‘good’ music is. In honor of Valentine’s Day, I polled my fellow students to figure out whether our collegiate romantic pursuits are shaped by the songs we hold close to our hearts.
To determine whether music taste influences the dating lives of my fellow Cornellians, I first needed to gauge whether music holds the same weight within the Cornell community as it does universally. When asked to describe their personal relationship to music, around 25% of my 72 respondents admitted that music is not a huge part of their daily lives; they have a couple of songs they like, but they really only absorb music in a social context. That being said, zero students indicated that they don’t care about music at all. The majority of respondents (~85%) expressed their adamant love for music, while 69% claim to be actively invested in the discovery of new music. The Cornell student body boasts a diverse range of music tastes: Survey respondents’ current favorite artists include Tyler Childers, Tyler the Creator, Noah Kahan, Radiohead, Joni Michell, Muse, Fiona Apple, Daft Punk and Cameron Winter.
So a love for music is apparent, as well as a diversity in taste — but is there an association with romance? I asked in my survey whether discovering someone’s music taste has changed the way you felt about them, and 72% said yes. Around 68% of responders indicated that sharing their music taste with someone feels like an intimate act, and I (and science) agree with the majority. Let’s say there’s a song I love, meaning it produces happy chemicals in my brain (serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, etc). If I find out that someone else loves it as much as I do, I’ll start to associate them with that song and the idea of them gets looped into the chemical reward pathway. Here’s another scenario: I’m crushing on someone, meaning their presence triggers the happy chemicals. If they show me a song they’re into, it becomes synonymous with them in my brain and begins to incite similar feelings. Sometimes, those positive feelings remain long after the person who induced them is gone: 50% of survey respondents admit that some of their current music taste has been influenced by past romantic relationships. And, for better or for worse, the association between a person and a song has been shown to stick around. An overwhelming majority (90%) of respondents indicated that there are songs they cannot listen to without being flooded with memories of a certain someone (thank you for sharing your songs, by the way; I put them all in this playlist).
Our romantic feelings for each other have proven to have a profound effect on our music taste, and vice versa. Originally I hypothesized that positive associations with certain songs would lead us to seek out partners who feel the same. However, when asked how important it is that their romantic partner listens to similar music as them, the majority responded that it is a bonus — not a necessity. Only 6% claimed that matching music preference is a dealbreaker, while 12% claimed that it was not important at all. Referencing the two hypotheticals I described earlier, it seems like the second one might be more common. While it’s possible that a shared music taste can blossom into romance, it’s more typical that having feelings for someone causes you to adopt their preferences. Our ability to create music may be inexplicably linked to our social and sexual dynamics, but they are not absolute laws that govern our choice in life partners. There are so many more factors that go into choosing a beau than whether or not they dig The Beatles!
Closing thoughts: Romance is complex, music is sexy, keep loving your songs, keep loving each other! Maybe instead of getting them chocolates for Valentine’s Day, lend them one of your AirPods as you walk to class.
Maya Blanchard is a senior in the college of Agriculture and Life Sciences. She can be reached at mblanchard@cornellsun.com.
Maya Blanchard is a member of the Class of 2026 in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. She is a staff writer for the Arts & Culture department and can be reached at mblanchard@cornellsun.com.
