Self-selected music enhances bench press performance compared to no-music alone and mood compared to stimulative and no-music conditions

Previous studies on music and performance mainly considered isometric contractions or endurance exercises and rarely included power output measures or a no-music condition as control. Therefore, this study aimed at investigating the effect of self-selected (SSM) and stimulative (STM) music, compared to a no-music condition (NM), on muscle power and affective states in the bench press (BP). Twenty regional-level athletes (age 23.5 ± 3.2 years; body mass 84.0 ± 10.0 kg; height 1.79 ± 0.08 m) underwent three sets of eight repetitions at 75% of their one repetition maximum for each music condition. Each repetition's average power (P_AVG) and peak power (P_PEAK) were calculated. The Borg scale CR-10 (RPE), the Feeling scale (FS), and the Felt arousal scale (FAS) were administered. A two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) for repeated measures was performed to assess the effects of music and sets on power performance. P_PEAK (p < 0.05) and P_AVG (p < 0.05) resulted greater in SSM than NM and decreased among sets (p < 0.001). Friedman test revealed that activation was greater in SSM than STM (p < 0.05) and NM (p < 0.01). Listening to music enhanced power performance, but listening to SSM could lead to higher psychophysical activation than STM. Therefore, we encourage listening to self-selected music during power training.