The path to happiness for music students: music empathy and music engagement as potential sources of subjective well-being

Music is widely known to enhance one's subjective well-being. However, we know little about the specific associations and potential pathways between music and subjective well-being among students majoring in music. The purpose of this study was to explore the links between music students' subjective well-being, music engagement, and music empathy while examining parallel mediation models involving self-esteem and prosocial tendencies. Through a questionnaire survey of music students, we found that positive links exist between subjective well-being, music empathy, and music engagement. Mediation analyses further demonstrated that self-esteem and prosocial tendencies parallelly mediate the positive associations of subjective well-being with music empathy and music engagement. These results indicate that perceiving, feeling, experiencing, and engaging more with music may enhance music students' self-esteem and prosocial tendencies and therefore further improve their subjective well-being. Our findings provide evidence for the positive relationship between music and subjective well-being among music students and provide further insights for improving the mental health and well-being of music students in real life.