When examining a song’s success, there has been research on different aspects of the song that may have an effect on its popularity. While many look into the instruments used that may impact the success of the song, I plan to look into the types of lyrics that appear most often in songs in the Billboard Hot 100 within a dataset from Kaggle (Nimer).
There has been research on how lyrics affect the success of a song specifically related to drugs and alcohol references. When examining references, it is stated that "the messages in popular music matter in terms of young people's learning or socialization, it should also be acknowledged that lyric 'content' is only part of a popular song's total message" (Christenson & Bjork). Messages in songs vary based on the content within the song and what the artist wants to come across out of their music. This is where the research that I will conduct comes into play. I plan to analyze the content being promoted wiwthin the lyrics to understand what the general theme is within the Billboard Hot 100 music charts. When understanding the content, I will be segmenting the study into different topics based on what comes out as the most popular lyrics.
Similarly, researchers have looked into gender objectification when analyzing lyrics in music. A study analyzes objectification theory and how sexual objectification occurs in music. According to the article, "women were targets of objectification significantly more often than men" (Lafrance & Worcester). Based on this information, my study will go into understanding how often women are mentioned in comparison to men. This will answer the question: "Are women-centric songs more likely to be successfale than men-centric songs?"
