Music Preferences Tend to Reflect Socio-Political Individual Differences

Prior research in music psychology has shown that music preferences reflect some individual differences, such as a person’s personality. However, a dearth of research addresses whether music preferences reflect socio-political individual differences, such as sexism, racism, and political ideology. We gathered data on these individual differences and music preferences (using the Short Test of Music Preferences Revised [STOMP-R]) from students (valid N = 217) in a rural southeastern part of the USA. Preferences for certain music genres had some large associations with socio-political variables in this sample. For example, preference for country music was positively correlated with hostile sexism, symbolic racism, and conservatism; meanwhile, preference for jazz music largely exhibited the opposite profile. Music preferences may reflect some key socio-political individual differences.