Auditory Abilities in Individuals With and Without Formal Musical Training

Abstract

Introduction: Auditory perception can be enhanced by musical training and practice. Considering the multiple brain areas involved in musical learning, good auditory perceptual skills can contribute to phonological awareness, speech recognition in the presence of noise, reading, syllable recognition, and other language skills. Material and methods: There were 30 adults between 18 and 27 years old who participated. They were divided into two groups: 15 individuals without formal musical training (Non-Musicians) and 15 individuals with 5 years or more of formal musical training (Musicians), paired by gender and age. Procedures used for assessing their hearing skills were the Duration Pattern test, Staggered Spondaic Word test, Masking Level Difference test, and Dichotic Consonant-Vowel test.Results: In all tests, the Musicians group showed a higher average score than the Non-Musicians. In the MLD test, the average level difference was 3 dB higher for the Musicians than for the Non-Musicians (p = 0.001). There were also statistically significant mean differences between the groups for the DP test, SSW test in the right ear, and DCV test (number of errors).Conclusions: Individuals with formal musical training show better auditory attention abilities, which are important for developing good listening skills, resulting in good communication and linguistic performance compared to individuals without prior musical training.