Your DNA May Help Explain Why Music Hits You So Hard

Why does the same song give one person chills while someone else barely reacts? A 2025 study published in Nature Communications suggests genetics may help explain part of that difference.

Researchers led by Giacomo Bignardi analyzed 9,169 Swedish twins to study what scientists call music reward sensitivity — the amount of pleasure people experience from music. By comparing identical and fraternal twins, the team estimated how much variation in musical enjoyment could be linked to genetic differences.

The study found that genetics accounted for roughly 54% of the variation in overall music enjoyment within the group studied. That does not mean 54% of a person’s music taste is determined by DNA. The research was not about whether someone prefers techno, house, dubstep or drum & bass. It was about how strongly people experience music as rewarding.

Researchers also examined five different aspects of music enjoyment: emotional response, mood regulation, seeking out music, pleasure from movement and rhythm, and the social reward of experiencing music with others. Genetic influence across these individual dimensions was estimated at roughly 42% to 52%.

The results suggest there is no single “music gene.” Instead, different aspects of musical pleasure appear to be influenced by partially distinct genetic pathways. The genes associated with wanting to move to music, for example, are not necessarily identical to those involved in emotional or social responses.

The study also found an important distinction between understanding music and enjoying it. Around 70% of the genetic influences associated with musical reward were independent of the genetic influences linked to musical perceptual ability and general reward sensitivity. In simple terms, being naturally good at recognizing rhythm, melody or pitch is not the same thing as being deeply affected by music.

For electronic music fans, that idea is easy to recognize. One person can hear a build-up and feel an immediate physical and emotional reaction, while another person hears the exact same track without experiencing the same intensity.

The researchers are not saying your DNA decides which track becomes your favorite or which artist ends up on repeat. Individual experiences, culture and environment still shape the specific music people connect with. The study instead suggests that biology may influence how strongly music is capable of rewarding us in the first place.

That makes the findings particularly interesting for dance music culture, where emotional reactions, movement and shared experiences are central to the entire scene. The rush of a drop, the chills from a melody or the feeling of an entire crowd reacting together may not simply come down to taste.

Your DNA probably does not decide what music you love.

But according to this study, it may help explain why some people feel it more intensely than others.

Source: Bignardi, G. et al. (2025). Twin modelling reveals partly distinct genetic pathways to music enjoyment. Nature Communications, 16, 2904.