Dancing to your own music: A study of movement in music performance and its relationship to enjoyment andengagement in ADHD musicians

We often feel the spontaneous need to move to music we enjoy, and we interpret the movement of musicians assigns of musical engagement (Dahl & Friberg, 2007). Theories in music cognition emphasise how musical experience is embodied, formed by actions we take in interaction with the environment (van der Schyff, 2022).Musicians associate their ability to make free and spontaneous movement with performance engagement and flow experience (MacLennan, 2015).

Despite this, study of performance movement in relation to engagement, enjoyment and flow is still under-researched.

There is exciting potential to expand our knowledge on this topic by considering neurodiversity. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) involves constantly shifting attention and increased impulsivity and spontaneity(ADHD UK, 2020). Most ADHD research uses a medicalised framework, which considers increased spontaneity and impulsiveness as symptoms of brain disorder (Levin, 2018).

This model has been extensively criticised by disabled people, who see this as an attempt to normalise them in a way that disregards their lived experience (Dwyer, 2022).However, impulsivity can afford musical engagement (Levin, 2018; Wilde & Welch, 2022), and provide space for positive experiences associated with ADHD, such as cognitive dynamism and transcendence (Sedgwick et al.,2018). By using a value-neutral neurodiversity framework (Dwyer, 2022), there is scope to understand how impulsivity, and other ADHD characteristics, contribute to the pleasure and engagement afforded by spontaneous performance movement.

The aims of this project are:

*To understand how performer movement relates to feelings of enjoyment and engagement, and how this intersects with the experience of ADHD. Sub aims *To contribute to a non-pathological understanding of ADHD in performance. *To use embodied frameworks to understand affective experiences and flow and their relationship to ancillary movement.

*To understand how a musician's movement interacts with physiological affect, and its relationship with flow experience.

To ensure that ADHD lived experience informs the research, participatory action research (PAR) (Aldrige, 2016) will be applied. Focus groups will explore musicians' experiences of performing and how this intersects with experience of ADHD. Using findings, case studies will be devised, where participants' performances will be recorded and then interviewed on their experience, using videos as stimulus.

Interviews will be analysed using a phenomenological analysis, to gain access to cognitive processes through experience. Quantitative measures of movement, using motion-capture, and physiological measures, will also be taken to make inferences about emotion in relation to movement patterns.

ADHD musicians will be recruited from the University of Birmingham and through several potential project partners. The ADHD Foundation have expressed interest in collaboration, and M4C official partners, the Birmingham Royal Ballet and the Royal Ballet Sinfonia have been approached. The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Chorus will also be approached, due to its connection to the University.

Partners will also be invited to contribute to the research development, via the PAR framework and knowledge exchange events. Giving voice to the peopleabout whom the research will be conducted is important in promoting equitable and inclusive research practices.