Cross‐cultural music phrase processing: An fMRI study

Abstract

The current study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the neural basis of musical phrase boundary processing during the perception of music from native and non-native cultures. German musicians performed a cultural categorization task while listening to phrased Western (native) and Chinese (non-native) musical excerpts as well as modified versions of these, where the impression of phrasing has been reduced by removing the phrase boundary marking pause (henceforth called "unphrased"). Bilateral planum temporale was found to be associated with an increased difficulty of identifying phrase boundaries in unphrased Western melodies. A network involving frontal and parietal regions showed increased activation for the phrased condition with the orbital part of left inferior frontal gyrus presumably reflecting working memory aspects of the temporal integration between phrases, and the middle frontal gyrus and intraparietal sulcus probably reflecting attention processes. Areas more active in the culturally familiar, native (Western) condition included, in addition to the left planum temporale and right ventro-medial prefrontal cortex, mainly the bilateral motor regions. These latter results are interpreted in light of sensorimotor integration. Regions with increased signal for the unfamiliar, non-native music style (Chinese) included a right lateralized network of angular gyrus and the middle frontal gyrus, possibly reflecting higher demands on attention systems, and the right posterior insula suggesting higher loads on basic auditory processing.

Dynamics of brain activity underlying working memory for music in a naturalistic condition

“…In a study by Leung & Alain (2011) right cerebellar activity in the tonsil, culmen and pyramis was revealed in a WM task relevant to location and category. This cerebellar activation might be in connection with temporal processing of the stimuli used (Mathiak, Hertrich, Grodd, & Ackermann, 2004 (Kane & Engle, 2002), with the IFG reflecting WM aspects in the integration of information over time (Nan et al, 2008). Activity in BA47 has in the context of music been linked with the processing of musical temporal structure, specifically with extracting the correct temporal information in a sequence (Chen et al 2008).…”

“…Working memory (WM) is at the core of any cognitive function as it is necessary for the integration of information over time (Nan, Knösche, Zysset, & Friederici, 2008) helping us make sense of the continuity of our experience of time and of our self. The study of WM is central to understanding how memory and thought work (Wager & Smith, 2003).…”

Musical phrase boundaries, wrap-up and the closure positive shift

“…The approach was based on the notion that the P2 component is related to high-level processing (e.g., De Diego Balaguer et al, 2007;Minati et al, 2010;Snyder et al, 2006), an idea shared by Neuhaus et al (2006) when pointing to a functional link between P2 and CPS. Based on fMRI results, Nan et al (2008) also suggested that the filling tones impair the integration of slowly evolving, predictive information (phrase contour, metrics, etc.) with the local information provided by the boundary pause.…”

“…This hypothesis is particularly relevant since it may clarify how listeners make sense of music. One view is that musical segments, including phrases, are first represented and then related to each other as parts of the whole musical piece (McAdams, 1989;Nan et al, 2008;Neuhaus, 2013;Pearce et al, 2010;Peretz, 1989). Consistent with this, probe tone paradigms have shown that within-phrase chord sequences have processing advantages over between-phrase chord sequences (Tan et al, 1981).…”

“…Source localization of the CPS identified brain regions related to both memory and attention (Knoesche et al, 2005). A fMRI study of the CPS paradigm (Nan et al, 2008) highlighted brain regions related to the maintenance of past events in on-line processing memory, as well as regions related to selective attention. The component's sensitivity to the preboundary tone has been associated with boundary strength (Nan et al, 2006;Neuhaus et al, 2006), but it might also relate to the representation of past events (retrospective processing) in a more general sense.…”