Musicality And The Brain

Several interesting studies about Music and the Brain have been conducted to better understand their relationship and show how music can effectively train the brain.

One study of the brain’s electrical and magnetic signals showed that musical training changes the auditory cortex-the part of the brain where the processing of sound takes place.

Researchers at the University in Ontario compared preschool aged children who took music lessons to those who didn’t. The children who took music lessons showed larger brain responses on a number of sound recognition tests than the children who didn’t take music lessons.

The researchers also looked into the question of whether musical training can change thinking or cognition in general. The researchers found that even those children who had only a year or two of music training had enhanced levels of memory, attention and executive control.

They hypothesize that musical training (but not passive listening to music) “affects attention and memory, which provides a mechanism whereby musical training might lead to better learning across a number of domains”. The motor and listening skills that are needed to play an instrument with other people involve “attention, memory and the ability to inhibit actions.” Passively listening to music does not bring about the same changes in attention and memory.

It is also interesting to see the effect that music can have on tone deafness and dyslexia. Researchers at Harvard University also studied the cognitive effects of musical training. They also found a correlation between early-childhood musical training and enhanced motor and auditory skills, as well as enhancements in verbal ability and non-verbal reasoning. This type of brain modification depends on the type of musical training. Singing is a specialized form of music training and changes locations in singers’ brains that are different from those changed in people who play a keyboard or other instrument.

But what was more striking was the connection between music training and language development among dyslexic children. Results suggest that music intervention that “strengthens the basic auditory music perception skills of children with dyslexia may also remediate some of their language deficits.”

People who are tone deaf-those people who cannot sing in tune and who can’t differentiate pitches, often have a reduced or absent arcuate fasciculus (AF)- a fiber tract that connects the frontal and temporal lobes in the brain. A reduced or damaged AF has been associated with people who have language problems and also in children with dyslexia.

In another study conducted by Antoine Shahin, it was shown that musical training gives a child the same acoustic responsiveness as someone two to three years older. It does not necessarily show that musical training leads to a higher IQ but neurons respond more to music.

When a person listens to a sound over and over, especially music or a voice that is harmonic or meaningful, the specific neurons get reinforced, and then respond preferentially to those sounds as opposed to other sounds. The researchers were studying the degree of auditory cortex responsiveness to music and non-familiar sounds as children age when they observed the neural response to familiar sounds.

They found that the ages of 10-13 are most likely a sensitive period for music and speech acquisition as this is when neurons were most responsive to sounds.

In another study, by Glenn Schellenberg of the University of Toronto, it was found that passive listening to music seems to help you perform better on certain cognitive tests in the short run, but that actual music lessons for kids, leads to longer lasting cognitive success. The effect of musical training for adults was harder to determine. So, musical training seems to make children smarter!!

In conclusion, music is great for your brain!