Do Plants Respond to Music?

Research Question:

• Do plants respond positively or negatively to music, or not at all?

People enjoy different types of music, and animals also respond to it. Do plants like music? The purpose of this study is to observe, whether exposure to classical music will affect the growth and health of plants.

Materials:

• Classical music
• 2-4 plants of the same type, health and age
• An environment ideal to that type of plant
• Camera

Experimental Procedure:

1. Place all plants in the same type of environment in terms of sunlight, temperature, water and soil.
2. Expose one of the plants to two to three hours of classical music per day.
3. Expose another plant to five to six hours of music per day.
4. The other two plants are your control plants: they will be exposed to no music.
5. Take pictures of each plant before the experiment. A picture can also be taken of all plants lined up next to each other.
6. Take the same pictures after two, four and eight weeks.
7. Note any visible and palpable differences between the plants that have been exposed to music and those that have not.
8. If there is a difference between the plants with and without music, notice if there is a difference between the plants who were exposed to less and those exposed to more music.

Terms/Concepts: plant psychology, the effects of sound environment on plant life, botany, palpable

Resources:

• "What are the effects of music on plants?" WikiAnswers, http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_effects_of_music_on_plants
• "How Do Plants React to Classical Music?" by Phillip Ginn, eHow, http://www.ehow.com/how-does_5421613_do-plants-react-classical-music.html