Current Research

Music and Social Media

In this modern age, sharing music on social media is a way of social bonding, one of the main evolutionary functions of music put forth by adaptationist theories. The pandemic has witnessed a surge in online music streaming and has put music consumption at the forefront, especially in times of crisis. This is because music can play the role of a social surrogate to an individual. The modern social world/social networking sites (SNS) have become the new norm when it comes to bonding with others and coping with anxiety and depression, especially by sharing music. Our ongoing research aims to analyse the nature of music sharing during these times and aid in understanding the social facet of music-related behaviour. The main themes of our research are related to music consumption and sharing i) during the pandemic on Twitter ii) related to depression subreddits iii) during social movements.

This project is in collaboration with Prof. PK and is funded by IHub-Data, IIIT Hyderabad.

Cocaine Project

This line of research is part of the Addimex CONN project in Collaboration with Dr. Eduardo A. Garza-Villarreal (National Autonomous University of Mexico) and Associate Prof. Madhura Ingalhalikar (Symbiosis Institute of Technology, Pune), which aims at investigating ConneResearch Studentme of substance addiction in Mexican population. The aim is to investigate differences in functional connectivity in cocaine users and predicting whole-brain functional connectivity from strucutral conenctivity in the same.

Cognitive neuroscience of music

The primary goal is to unearth music processing in the brain via functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and how individual differences (personality, musical expertise, musical aptitude, empathy) modulate functional connectivity thereof. This is part of the Tunteet Project lead by Prof. Elvira Brattico (Aarhus University, Denmark) in collaboration with Prof. Petri Toiviainen (University of Jyvaskyla) which aims at investigating music processing and musicality in the naturalistic listening paradigm and involves several neuroimaging and neurophysiological measures in addition to behavioral and cognitive tests.

Music and depression

Music serves a variety of functions in daily life and plays an important role in mental well-being by impacting moods, emotions and other affective states. Also, music can be considered a "mirror of the self" and our music listening strategies and habits speak volumes about our mental states and individual traits. The focus of this research is to identify risk of depression via music listening habits and uncover patterns that might be indicative of individual traits.