Positive Moods before Listening to Music Enhance Groove

The urge to move one’s body with pleasurable sensations induced by listening to music are defined as groove. Individual differences in groove have been noted, but most of these differences are predominantly limited to personal musical abilities. This study thus aimed to examine the influence of pre-listening mood on groove. Online listening experiments were conducted using drum breaks. The primary results were as follows: (1) The groove experience induced by music varied with the listener’s mood before listening to the music. (2) The participants who were in a positive mood before listening to the music rated the drum break as groovier than those who had a negative mood. (3) The tendency was more evident for the stimuli with higher groove levels, with the participants in a positive mood experiencing the groovier stimuli as groovier. In sum, groove ratings varied with the pre-listening moods of the individual listeners.