Transcript 3680Lecture35

The Neuroscience of Music
Main points
• Music is like language
– Characterized by rhythmic sequential sounds
– Has syntax: “rules” by which a sequence of notes is ordered
– Conveys information
Main points
• Music is unlike language
– Set of sounds is arguably smaller
– Information content and rate is vastly greater in language
– Musicianship is not nearly as prevalent: not everyone is a
musician
• Although some argue only a small number of people are
actually “amusic”
– Language is rarely used by groups
• compare People's Mic to a symphony
Main points
• Music is universal e.g.:
– Neolithic flutes produce
similar musical intervals
• Thus music hasn’t changed
much in 35,000 years!
– All moms sing to their
babies
– Very young children can
move with rhythm
What has Cognitive Neuroscience
figured out about music:
– Relationship between language and music?
– Are musician’s brains different?
What has Cognitive Neuroscience
figured out about music:
• Evidence from neuropsychology:
– Aphasia and Amusia are doubly-dissociable
• Aphasics can sing in tune but the lyrics are distorted
• Amusia (tone-deafness)
– Congenital or acquired
– Normal speaking (including normal prosody)
Functional imaging of Language and Music
• Listening to music and listening to speech engage
overlapping brain regions particularly:
•
Auditory cortex
•
dorsal pre-motor cortex (also for production)
Why do you think these would be overlapping?
Functional imaging of Language and Music
• Listening to music and listening to speech engage
overlapping brain regions particularly:
•
Auditory cortex
•
dorsal pre-motor cortex (also for production)
• However, one general observation is that music
processes tend to engage more right-hemisphere
structures than left
– Note this is generally the opposite of language processes,
which tend to be strongly left-lateralized
How does musical training affect the brain?
• Skilled musicians are unique in that they
– Start at a young age
– Spend lots of time on practice
– Does this lead to a difference in brain functional anatomy?
Musicians differ from non-musicians
• Ohinishi et al. 2001 compared musicians to nonmusicians in a passive (music) listening task
Non- Musicians
Musicians
Musicians differ from non-musicians
• Differences are in Planum Temporale and Dorsolateral
Prefronatal Cortex
– Left PT activation correlates (negatively) with age of start of musical training
– Left dlPFC and left PT activation correlates with skill at solfege
Musicians differ from non-musicians
• Gaser & Schlaug (2003)
looked for correlation between
grey matter volume and
musicianship (pro > amateur >
non)
• Billateral differences in
somatosensory and primary
motor
• Left lateralized differences in
inferior temporal gyrus and left
pre-motor adjacent to Broca’s
Perfect Pitch
• Absolute (or “perfect”) pitch is
the ability to name a pitch
class (a “note”) without any
reference
– Not same as “relative pitch”
•
Very rare
•
More common in:
– East asians (tonal language)
– Early music training
– Autism spectrum disorder and
synesthesia
Perfect Pitch
• Loui et al. (2010) used Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) to show
that people with AP have denser white-matter connection
between superior and middle temporal gyri of the left hemisphere
AP1
AP2
Controls
Back to the connection
between music and language
• Is there a general picture that emerges from the
contrasts between musicians and non-musicians?
Back to the connection
between music and language
• Is there a general picture that emerges from the
contrasts between musicians and non-musicians?
• In very broad terms, musical training seems to push
music processes onto language structures
– Left lateralization for musicians
– Left posterior temporal gyrus (in or near Wernicke’s)
– Left lateral frontal cortex (in or near Broca’s)
Music Synchronizes Brains
• Musicians playing together exhibit synchronized brain electrical
activity