A study of Junior High school students’ singing experience and emotion regulation

[[abstract]]Taking 488 Grade 8 students from 16 junior high schools of Kaohsiung City as the targets, the study accumulates the information about the aspect of their singing experience and their viewpoints of emotion regulation, as well as the aspect of their actual feelings. According to the background conditions of the sex of students, districts of their schools, extra-curricular music learning experience of students, size of schools, fondness of singing, and so on, this paper analyzes the related factors affecting their emotion regulation so as to provide a reference for the music teachers in designing their instruction. Having referred to the related literature, the researcher formulates the “rating scale of correlation between the singing experience and the emotion regulation of junior high school students” as the research tool. Based on the related literature, four constructs of the rating scale are summarized in this study: correlation between the singing function and value and the emotion regulation, correlation between the kinds of songs and the emotion regulation, effects of the related factors of teachers’ singing instruction on the emotion regulation of students, and effects of the personal factors of students’ singing learning on the emotion regulation. In order to make the research results more detailed and authentic, this study uses such data processing ways as the frequency distribution in percentage (%), T-test of paired samples, T-test of independent samples and single-factor analysis of variances (ANOVA). After investigation, the study acquires concrete results as follows: 1. In the aspect of their viewpoints, the junior high school students generally agree that the singing experience would cause effects on the emotion regulation. 2. In the aspect of their actual feelings, except the construct of “correlation between the kinds of songs and the emotion regulation,” the junior high school students quite agree that the singing experience at school can affect the emotion regulation. 3. In the aspects of viewpoints and actual feelings of the junior high school students, the difference of their agreement has reached the significant level. 4. The junior high school students’ agreement to the effects of singing experience on the emotion regulation varies with the different background variables. Finally, according to the research results, the researcher proposes several suggestions to the administration of the schools, music teachers and the subsequent researchers of the related issue. It is hoped that through this study and the subsequent studies, a concrete reference can be provided for the music teachers in the planning of their singing instruction. Furthermore, the study attempts to urge the schools to review the emotion effects from the learning of singing, develop some practical courses which can link the music education with the emotion education, and take the related measures appropriately at the right timing. It is also expected that the emotion development of junior high school students can be stabilized.