Increased pain resilience among heavy metal music festival attendees

This study investigated whether attending a metal music festival (which took place in August, 2023) could provide pain relief, particularly given that metal music is often associated with negative emotions such as anger. A between-group design compared a pre-festival group (n = 60) with a festival-attending group (n = 62) on measures of pain tolerance, pain sensitivity, pain unpleasantness, and heart rate variability (specifically, the standard deviation of normal-to-normal intervals, SDNN). Potential confounding variables, including general pain sensitivity, anticipatory joy, and alcohol consumption, were assessed. Results of a confirmatory analysis of the whole sample showed no significant differences in pain perception. Results of an exploratory analysis, which excluded participants exceeding a pre-defined threshold of heavy alcohol consumption, showed a significant difference in pain tolerance between the groups (F(1, 93) = 5.543, p = .021, Cohen's d = 0.501). While pain sensitivity and pain unpleasantness did not differ between both groups, pain tolerance increased during the festival. These results may be interpreted as a proxy of increased resilience in participants during the festival and are discussed in terms of a stimulation of oxytocin release during an intense social music event. No evidence for improved emotional processing, as indexed by SDNN, was observed. The current study was a field study with a sample of metal music fans participating at the Wacken Open Air metal music festival. It is therefore not yet certain if the current results pertain to the Wacken Open Air experience, which is known among metal fans to be especially inclusive and friendly, for metal festivals in general, or for music festivals in general.