Subsequently, participants were asked to indicate the reasons why they had listened to music by choosing from among the following options: ‘relaxation,’ ‘activation,’ ‘distraction,’ and ‘reducing boredom.’ These have been stated as the most common reasons for listening to music in previous studies (Juslin et al., 2008; Linnemann et al., 2015b). Further, in the context of pain, it has been long discussed whether music listening is effective in reducing pain by distracting from pain and/or by inducing relaxation (Mitchell and MacDonald, 2012). This therefore highlights the importance of investigating the link between reasons for music listening and potential pain- and stress-reducing effects.