Multiple pathways to social bonding through music

Music is widely recognized for its ability to foster social bonding. Yet, while research has largely focused on interpersonal movement coordination, other ways in which music can connect people have received comparatively less attention. We argue that music-related social bonding extends beyond coordinated movement and emerges through multiple forms of imagined and shared social experience. We propose a conceptual framework comprising three interrelated pathways: interpersonal coordination, shared social experience without explicit behavioral coordination, and imagined social experience during solitary listening. Across these pathways, music recruits interacting mechanisms of temporal prediction, self-other integration, reward processing, and social-cognitive alignment that together promote social closeness, affiliation, and prosocial orientation. We further highlight how musical features and individual differences shape these processes. By integrating evidence from music psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and social psychology, this framework broadens current perspectives on how music promotes social bonding and identifies conceptual and methodological directions for future research.