What Is Neuroarts?

Scientific studies increasingly confirm what human beings across cultures and throughout time have long recognized: we are wired for art. The arts in all of their modalities can improve our physical and mental health, amplify our ability to prevent, manage, or recover from disease challenges, enhance brain development in children, build more equitable communities, and foster wellbeing through multiple biological systems.

Neuroarts is the transdisciplinary study of how the arts and aesthetic experiences measurably change the body, brain, and behavior and how this knowledge is translated into specific practices that advance health and wellbeing.

Neuroarts is the place where a growing body of research-based knowledge about how the brain and body respond to the experience of art is stored. And it is the springboard for interventions and programs that translate that knowledge into practice in clinics, homes, workplaces, and communities, all in service to individual and collective well-being.

Across time, in moments of personal and planetary stress, in rural and urban settings around the globe, people have sought artistic outlets to prevent or treat illness, express joy, soothe fear, ease grief, and build community. The oldest archeological discoveries reveal the longstanding human pursuit of self-expression and the most recent pandemic reminds us again that people turn to art in times of need. Now, scientists and artists are coming together to build a field based on a growing understanding of how the arts in all of its many modalities can advance health and wellbeing.

The nascent field of neuroarts rests at the crossroads of science, the arts, and technology.

What the Science Reveals

Because the brain is agile, exposure to arts of all kinds fosters interconnectivity across a vast and complex network populated by hundreds of billions of neurons, influencing how we process and perceive creative experiences. The brain systems that engage with reward, motor activity, perception, and the senses are stimulated by art in ways unmatched by anything else.

In recent years, new tools and technology have emerged to reveal and measure the complex neural mechanisms that are involved. Revolutionary advances in imaging capacities, portable devices, and wearable sensors allow us to observe how the brain changes, nanosecond by nanosecond, in response to stimuli. They help us map what happens as we take in the world through the portals of sound, sight, scent, touch, and taste.

The Evidence for Arts as Medicine

That science reveals that art can work hand in hand with traditional medicine to improve mobility, memory, and speech; relieve pain and the after-effects of trauma; enhance mental health and learning outcomes; build resilience; and prevent disease.^1,2,3 Beyond its value for individuals, the arts can engage stakeholders collectively in pursuit of stronger, more equitable, and more resilient communities.^4,5,6,7,8

Arts interventions can lower the burden and cost of chronic and degenerative diseases, mental health challenges, addiction, and trauma.

Different art forms engage the brain in different ways, as this small sample of findings suggests:

• Music improves cognitive function in people with dementia,⁹ reduces the anxiety associated with cancer,¹⁰ relieves symptoms of trauma,^11,12 and improves motor coordination.^13,14

• Dance eases symptoms of Parkinson’s disease¹⁵ and improves psychological health.¹⁶

• Poetry helps patients and health professionals deal with end-of-life challenges¹⁷ while reading fiction improves the capacity for compassion.¹⁸

• Architecture, interior design, and urban planning promote healing in the clinic,^19,20,21,22 manage stress among health providers,^23,24 enhance workplace wellness,^25,26,27 and increase physical activity in the community.²⁸

For more evidence, see News and Resources.

The World Health Organization “finds evidence of the contribution of the arts to the promotion of good health and the prevention of a range of mental and physical health conditions, as well as the treatment or management of acute and chronic conditions arising across the life-course.” ²⁹

Building on Knowledge and Learning More

Neuroarts provides scientific explanations for artistic traditions that date back through the millennia and offers a framework for translating contemporary scholarship into practice. With the help of technology, we increasingly understand the mechanisms through which art changes the brain, biology, and behavior and drives us towards health and well-being.

But there is much more to learn so that we can develop and build on the science with rigor, including the best ways to deliver art, the optimal dose and duration of the therapy, and how to tailor it to individual experiences, opportunities, and challenges. The field is at an inflection point, offering the hope of tackling some of society’s most intractable problems. Whether through dance, song, writing, or painting, approached either as maker or beholder, health and well-being is enhanced by expressions of self, experience, imagination, and creativity. Neuroarts helps us harness and mobilize these powerful biological forces and realize the promise of art.