Cortical Plasticity Induced by Short-Term Unimodal and Multimodal Musical Training

Lappe, Claudia; Herholz, Sibylle C.; Trainor, Laurel J.; Pantev, Christo

doi:10.1523/jneurosci.2254-08.2008

Cited by 236 publications

(225 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…However, future studies that formally compare the effect of pure audiovisual vs. audiovisual-motor training schemes on audiovisual synchrony perception are needed to further dissociate the contributions of sensory-motor from pure audiovisual (i.e., sensory) learning effects. In the unisensory domains, the role of audio-motor experience has recently been highlighted in a magnetoencephalography (MEG) study showing a larger mismatch negativity for deviant musical structures after audio-motor (i.e., piano practicing) than pure auditory learning (39). Conversely, studies comparing motor skills that are and are not associated with sounds (e.g., pianists vs. athletes) are needed to confirm that motor skills per se do not afford higher sensitivity to the temporal misalignment of auditory and visual signals.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-term music training tunes how the brain temporally binds signals from multiple senses

Lee

Noppeney

2011

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

154

183

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Practicing a musical instrument is a rich multisensory experience involving the integration of visual, auditory, and tactile inputs with motor responses. This combined psychophysics-fMRI study used the musician's brain to investigate how sensory-motor experience molds temporal binding of auditory and visual signals. Behaviorally, musicians exhibited a narrower temporal integration window than nonmusicians for music but not for speech. At the neural level, musicians showed increased audiovisual asynchrony responses and effective connectivity selectively for music in a superior temporal sulcus-premotor-cerebellar circuitry. Critically, the premotor asynchrony effects predicted musicians' perceptual sensitivity to audiovisual asynchrony. Our results suggest that piano practicing fine tunes an internal forward model mapping from action plans of piano playing onto visible finger movements and sounds. This internal forward model furnishes more precise estimates of the relative audiovisual timings and hence, stronger prediction error signals specifically for asynchronous music in a premotor-cerebellar circuitry. Our findings show intimate links between action production and audiovisual temporal binding in perception.audiovisual synchrony | multisensory integration | sensorimotor learning | crossmodal integration | experience-dependent plasticity P racticing a musical instrument is a rich multisensory experience involving the integration of visual, auditory, and tactile inputs with motor responses. The musician's brain, thus, provides an ideal model to study experience-dependent plasticity in humans (1, 2).Previous research in musicians has focused on neural plasticity affecting unisensory and motor processing. Little is known about how musical expertise alters the integration of inputs from multiple senses. Because musical performance requires precise timing, musical expertise may specifically modulate the temporal binding of sensory signals. Given the variability in physical and neural transmission times, sensory signals do not have to be precisely synchronous but must co-occur within a temporal window that flexibly adapts to the temporal statistics of the sensory inputs as a consequence of music (3) or audiovisual training (4). At the neural level, audiovisual (a)synchrony processing relies on a widespread neural system encompassing subcortical, primary sensory, higher-order association, cerebellar, and premotor areas (5-8).This study used the musician's brain as a model to investigate how long-term sensory-motor experience (i.e., piano practicing) shapes the neural processes underlying temporal binding of auditory and visual signals. We presented subjects with synchronous and asynchronous speech and piano music as two stimulus classes that are both characterized by a rich hierarchical temporal structure but linked to different motor effectors (mouth vs. hand). Comparing the effect of musical expertise on synchrony perception of speech and music allowed us to dissociate generic and context-specific neural mechanisms ...

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-term music training tunes how the brain temporally binds signals from multiple senses

Lee

Noppeney

2011

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

154

183

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“…Although preexisting differences can influence musical activity and abilities, it is also clear that auditory abilities and their underlying neural substrates are highly malleable due to experience (e.g., Alain et al, 2007;Lappe et al, 2008). Thus, it is likely that although differences in personality or preexisting perceptual abilities might lead some individuals to choose to learn a musical instrument or play music video games, the actual experience of practicing these activities is what leads to differences in music aptitude.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The past two decades have nevertheless witnessed an abundance of reports suggesting that "musicians" outperform "nonmusicians" on measures of sensory, cognitive, and motor functions (Hannon & Trainor, 2007;Strait & Kraus, 2014). Studies with tightly controlled learning situations have demonstrated that remarkable behavioral and neural changes can occur as a result of auditory learning (e.g., Alain, Snyder, He, & Reinke, 2007;Lappe, Herholz, Trainor, & Pantev, 2008), or even passive exposure to musical stimuli (e.g., Hannon & Trehub, 2005). However, other evidence suggests that personality differences predict who undertakes music training and who does not (e.g., Corrigall, Schellenberg, & Misura, 2013).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

How musical are music video game players?

2016

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Numerous studies have shown that formal musical training is associated with sensory, motor, and cognitive advantages in individuals of various ages. However, the nature of the observed differences between musicians and nonmusicians is poorly understood, and little is known about the listening skills of individuals who engage in alternative types of everyday musical activities. Here, we show that people who have frequently played music video games outperform nonmusicians controls on a battery of music perception tests. These findings reveal that enhanced musical aptitude can be found among individuals who play music video games, raising the possibility that music video games could potentially enhance music perception skills in individuals across a broad spectrum of society who are otherwise unable to invest the time and/or money required to learn a musical instrument.

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“…Indeed, assignment to musical training has been found to yield structural changes in auditory and motor cortices that correlate with performance on melody discrimination and finger tapping tasks, respectively ( Although the above results suggest some transfer attributable to musical training (see also Lappe et al, 2008;Besson et al, 2011), one remaining question is whether the occurrence of transfer is selective to specific points in development. Can musical training-related cognitive differences persist beyond childhood?…”

Section: Expertise and Generalizationmentioning

confidence: 97%

Generality and specificity in the effects of musical expertise on perception and cognition

Carey

Rosen²,

Krishnan

et al. 2015

Cognition

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Performing musicians invest thousands of hours becoming experts in a range of perceptual, attentional, and cognitive skills. The duration and intensity of musicians' training -far greater than that of most educational or rehabilitation programs -provides a useful model to test the extent to which skills acquired in one particular context (music) generalize to different domains. Here, we asked whether the instrument-specific and more instrument-general skills acquired during professional violinists' and pianists' training would generalize to superior performance on a wide range of analogous (largely non-musical) skills, when compared to closely matched non-musicians.Violinists and pianists outperformed non-musicians on fine-grained auditory psychophysical measures, but surprisingly did not differ from each other, despite the different demands of their instruments. Musician groups did differ on a tuning system perception task: violinists showed clearest biases towards the tuning system specific to their instrument, suggesting that long-term experience leads to selective perceptual benefits given a training-relevant context. However, we found only weak evidence of group differences in non-musical skills, with musicians differing marginally in one measure of sustained auditory attention, but not significantly on auditory scene analysis or multi-modal sequencing measures. Further, regression analyses showed that this sustained auditory attention metric predicted more variance in one auditory psychophysical measure than did musical expertise. Our findings suggest that specific musical expertise may yield distinct perceptual outcomes within contexts close to the area of training. Generalization of expertise to relevant cognitive domains may be less clear, particularly where the task context is non-musical.Keywords: expertise; musicians; perception; cognition; generalization GENERALITY AND SPECIFICITY IN MUSICAL EXPERTISE EFFECTS 3 Highlights 1. We studied generalization of expertise to auditory perceptual and broader cognitive skills.2. Musician groups perceived auditory signal differences more finely than non-musicians.3. Musician groups differed in fine perception given a training-relevant context. 4. Musical expertise did not strongly generalize to several cognitive measures (e.g., auditory scene analysis).5. 5. Sustained attention predicted variance in fine perception of AM depth above expertise. GENERALITY AND SPECIFICITY IN MUSICAL EXPERTISE EFFECTS 4 Generality and Specificity in the Effects of Musical Expertise on Perception and CognitionPerceptual and cognitive skills can be shaped and enhanced through our experience with the world (e.g., Goldstone, 1999;Palmeri & Gauthier, 2004). Pursuit of expertise in a given domain is a particularly striking example: groups as diverse as chess masters, physicians, athletes and musicians spend thousands of hours training and practicing, honing perceptual, cognitive and motor skills critical to success in their field (see Ericsson, 2006;Palmeri et al., 2004; Chi, 200...

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Cortical Plasticity Induced by Short-Term Unimodal and Multimodal Musical Training

Cited by 236 publications

References 44 publications

Long-term music training tunes how the brain temporally binds signals from multiple senses

Long-term music training tunes how the brain temporally binds signals from multiple senses

How musical are music video game players?

Generality and specificity in the effects of musical expertise on perception and cognition

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