Relationships of Music Preference with Perceived Intelligence,

People listen to music on a daily basis, whether it is in the car, on the radio, on a television commercial, in an elevator, or at a concert; music is ubiquitous. Rentfrow and Gosling's (2003) developed a theory of musical preferences. This theory includes aspects of personality, self-views, and cognitive abilities and how they can all play roles in forming a musical preference. Social and physical environments that people select reflect their personalities, and so do their musical environments and preferences (Buss, 1987). Rentfrow and Gosling (2003) measured different aspects of personality, cognitive ability and self-views. They found that participants who preferred the same genres of music also had similar views of themselves and shared personality traits. Rentfrow and Gosling (2003) classified music into four major categories: Reflexive and Complex; Intense and Rebellious; Upbeat and Conventional; and Energetic and Rhythmic. These four headings include 14 genres of music. In the current study we focused on Intense and Rebellious music which includes alternative, rock, and heavy metal music. Previous research has found that the participants who prefer Intense and Rebellious music share specific similar traits. For example, they view themselves as having higher levels of self-perceived intelligence as well as good athletic abilities (Rentfrow & Gosling, 2003). The purpose of the present study is to replicate and extend Rentfrow and Gosling's (2003) findings, specifically to replicate the finding that preference for Intense and Rebellious music is related to the perception of higher self-perceived intelligence. To extend the research we also examine the relationship between music preference and scores on an actual intelligence test.