The Science of dance

Music and dance have been part of many cultures, since a long time ago. “Dance is a language, an expression that emerges from a community, If you know the steps, it means you belong to the group” says the choreographer Camille A. Brown.

From the choreographies of the African slaves who were sent to North America to the hip-hop of the 90s, through Charleston and Lindy hop, I’ve been wondering why we dance? well, I asked around and they all gave me different answers: To move, to let go, to express ourselves, to heal ourselves, to share, to speak the same language, to exist, to be happy, to be free… I could keep going, since there are endless reasons why we move our feet along to the rhythm.

The psychology of dancing

According to psychology, dance is a social function that makes us feel good and closer to those who move with us, if you wanna know the scientific explanation of this, let me tell you that dancing triggers the endorphin system of the brain and generates a feeling of warmth and calm that makes you experience affinity when we coincide with someone doing something as simple and inevitable as following a rhythm.

From back in the time when the primate group expanded until now, humans have danced together, whenever the occasion arose. Researchers assure that dancing has more beneficial effects on your health, happiness and longevity than anything else. But, the science of dance is more than psycologycal benefits

Dancing and neuroscience

Dance is a fundamental form of human expression, everyone can do it. According to neuroscience, it is believed that our brain is made by movement so that we all can evolve. That is its mission in life, when brain images of amateur and professional dancers began to be examined by neuroscientists, they found out that to execute even the simplest steps, intricate mental coordination was required. This whole dance process, he pointed out, requires ‘proprioception’, a term conceived by the English neurophysiologist and Nobel Prize in Medicine Charles Scott Sherrington, which means conception of one’s own body. He added that it is thanks to this exercise that the human being has a dynamic image of himself in motion and is capable of developing it.

The first thing a neurobiologist thinks about dance is the motor cortex (located on the surface of the frontal lobe). It is the part of the brain that exerts voluntary movement and transmits information through axons to the spinal cord. There is a second neuron that goes directly to the muscle to order it to move. I bet you didn’t think that dance has its own science, but indeed it does.

When dancing, you are aware of your expression and have a feedback system from your brain to your muscles and vice versa. That’s where the modulation of the movement happens. The ability to perceive music is a main factor as well, to move you need to integrate the senses and this in dance is fundamental. Not only is the sensory part integrated with the motor part to execute; also adding the part of conception of the space to be able to move.

Also read: Human beings are designed for dancing

In psychology dancing can be perceived as a language, human postures are effective in transmitting information. This language of postures and the rhythm of a sequence of steps are the raw material of a dance. The spectator is a fundamental part of the dance process, since the individual who appreciates a dance is seeing or feeling the movements, but also evaluating what the dancer can do; any human is able to judge the complexity of a movement because they have his own body reference, let’s try that out, watch this dance demo of one of our instructors and performers and leave us a comment regarding your perception of their moves. We wanna know your thoughts!

Let’s experience together the science of dance!