Music Lessons, Emotional Intelligence, and IQ

musically trained and untrained participants were administered tests of emotional intelligence and IQ. As in previous research, trained participants scored higher than untrained participants on the IQ Composite score and on its Verbal and Nonverbal subtests. The advantage for the trained group on the Composite score and on the Nonverbal subtest was evident even when gender, parents' education, family income, and first language were held constant. The groups performed similarly, however, on the test of emotional intelligence, and scores on the IQ test were only weakly correlated with scores on the emotional intelligence test. The results imply that (1) associations between music lessons and nonmusical abilities are limited to intellectual abilities, and/or (2) associations between music lessons and emotional intelligence are not evident on visual- and/or text-based tests of emotional intelligence such as the one used here.