Nostalgic songs: Why we still love the 70s and 80s music we listened to while growing up

Hand with lighter at old rock concert

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Music has an uncanny way of bringing us back to a specific point in time, and each generation seems to have its own opinions about which nostalgic songs will live on as classics.

The long-lasting emotional impact of such tunes are considered part of a reminiscence bump: “the disproportionately higher recall of early-life memories.”
Tune love transmitted from generation to generation

You know you can’t forget the nostalgic songs that narrated your teens and early twenties. But, one thing that psychological researchers didn’t expect that many young adults are also fond of, and have an emotional connection to, the music that was popular for their parents’ generation.

“Music transmitted from generation to generation shapes autobiographical memories, preferences, and emotional responses, a phenomenon we call cascading ‘reminiscence bumps,'” explains psychological scientist and lead researcher Carol Lynne Krumhansl of Cornell University.

“These new findings point to the impact of music in childhood and likely reflect the prevalence of music in the home environment.”

The study, published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, reveals that while songs that were popular in our early 20s seem to have the greatest lasting emotional impact, music that was popular during our parents’ younger days also evokes vivid memories.

MORE: How to convert vinyl to digital so you can listen to those awesome old records again

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The first “reminiscence bump”

To explore the connection between autobiographical memories and musical memories, Krumhansl and Justin Zupnick of the University of California, Santa Cruz asked 62 college-age participants listen to two top Billboard hits per year from 1955 to 2009.

The researchers wanted to see which periods of music were most memorable for the participants, which songs conjured up the strongest feelings, and which ones made the participants happy, sad, energized or nostalgic.

In addition, participants were asked whether they remembered listening to the song by themselves, with their parents, or amongst friends.

The data revealed that participants’ personal memories associated with songs increased steadily as they got older, from birth until the present day.

This finding makes sense – we recall more recent songs better, ascribe memories to them more easily, and feel a stronger emotional connection with them.

But the more surprising finding — one which the researchers didn’t expect to see — was a drastic bump in memories, recognition, perceived quality, liking, and emotional connection with the music that was popular in the early 1980s, when the participants’ parents were about 20-25 years old.

That is, participants seemed to demonstrate a particular affinity for the songs their parents were listening to as young adults.

Previous research has shown that the music we encounter during late adolescence and early adulthood has the greatest impact on our lives. But these findings suggest that the music played throughout childhood can also leave a lasting impact.

1980s concert - Run-DMC and Beastie Boys (1987)

Nostalgic songs: Another reminiscence bump

And there was another, albeit smaller, ‘reminiscence bump’ for the music of the 1960s — more than two decades before the participants were born.

Krumhansl and Zupnick speculate that reminiscence for this music could have been transmitted from the participants’ grandparents, who would have been in their 20s or 30s in the 1960s.

Another possibility — one that might be favored by those of the Baby Boomer generation [and likely disputed by Gen X] — is that the music of the 1960s is truly of higher quality.

The researchers launched a survey to explore these questions further. The survey will include a century of top hits, and Krumhansl and Zupnick hope that listeners of all ages, especially older adults, will participate.

“It will be fascinating to see if we can trace intergenerational influences back through more generations, better understand the ‘sixties’ bump,’ and look for effects of the vast changes in music technology that have occurred over the last century,” says Krumhansl.

Nancy J Price & Betsy Bailey

Nancy J Price & Betsy Bailey

We're Nancy and Betsy, and we've been adventuring in the digital world since the mid-90s -- truly making us that type of entrepreneurial internet pioneer Gen X is known for! We started Myria.com back in 1998 and later launched SheKnows.com -- among various other online and print projects. Our partnership has spanned decades and crossed state lines (multiple times!). Nancy currently resides Arizona, and Betsy's newest home base is Minnesota. It's been an incredible journey of collaboration and innovation. You can read more about our story here!

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