Scientists reveal surprisingly simple trick to stop travel sickness fast

New research has revealed a surprising way to alleviate symptoms of car sickness

Symptoms of car sickness include nausea, vomiting, dizziness and headache(Image: Getty Images)

Nothing ruins a long drive more than travel sickness. When the dizziness and nausea sets in, you’re often counting down the minutes until you reach your destination.

Whether you’re travelling by car, boat, plane or train, motion sickness happens when the brain gets conflicting information from the inner ears, eyes, and nerves in the joints and muscles.

With many over-the-counter travel sickness treatments known to cause drowsiness, some people use strategies like looking at the horizon or opening a window to get fresh air in a desperate attempt to keep nausea at bay.

However, a team of scientists claim to have discovered another trick that has shown to slash car sickness symptoms by more than half: Playing happy music.

“Motion sickness significantly impairs the travel experience for many individuals, and existing pharmacological interventions often carry side-effects such as drowsiness,” explained Dr Qizong Yue of Southwest University, China, author of the study.

“Music represents a non-invasive, low-cost, and personalized intervention strategy.”

And it seems that the type of music you listen to matters. The study found that joyful music alleviated carsickness the most, reducing it by 57.3 per cent.

Happy music may help to stop car sickness, a study suggests(Image: Getty Images)

This very closely followed by soft music, at 56.7 per cent, while passionate music reduced motion sickness by 48.3 per cent.

However, the team found that playing sad music turned out to be less effective than doing nothing, reducing symptoms by 40 per cent.

The control group, who listened to no music during their recovery period, reported a reduction of carsickness symptoms by 43.3 per cent.

“Based on our conclusions, individuals experiencing motion sickness symptoms during travel can listen to cheerful or gentle music to achieve relief,” said Dr Yue.

The study looked at 40 people in a driving simulator with a route designed to make people feel carsick. Of that group, 30 people reported past carsickness.

The scientists used EEG caps to look at the brain activity of the participants, which were divided into six groups: Four that listened to music, one that received no music, and one whose simulators were stopped when they started to report that they might feel slightly carsick. The latter group was used to compare brain activity to ‘non-carsick’ participants.

The groups performed a driving task and reported their level of carsickness to the scientists. Once they stopped driving, the participants in the music groups were played music for 60 seconds, and then asked to report how sick they felt.

While joyful music appeared to have the greatest effect on symptoms, the research team say more studies are needed to confirm these results.

“The primary limitation of this study is its relatively small sample size,” explained Dr Yue. “This constraint results in limited statistical power.”

The study was published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.

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