The Effects of Binaural Beats on Working Memory

Abstract

This paper was originally written for Dr. George Alder Psychology 201W course Introduction to Research Methods in Psychology. The assignment asked students to upload their final research project report and analyze data given by their respective TAs using the appropriate statistics. The paper uses APA7 citation style.

The effects of binaural beats on working memory is a growing field in scientific literature. Previous research reports mixed results (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019a; Jirakittayakorn & Wongsawat, 2017; Shekar et al., 2018). In this study, participants (N = 60) were randomly assigned to listen to either the gamma frequency or white noise. They memorized a list of English words and then performed a distraction task to control for the serial position effect. After, they completed a word free recall test as a measure of working memory. Results showed that those in the gamma frequency condition performed significantly better on the recall test than those in the white noise condition, t(57) = 5.45, p < .01. The findings may be of interest to students, who may wish to listen to gamma beats when studying for exams. The findings are consistent with the results of prior studies (Garcia-Argibay et al., 2019a; Jirakittayakorn & Wongsawat, 2017). The report includes limitations of the current study.