Longitudinal Analysis of Music Education on Executive Functions in Primary School Children

Abstract

Background: Research on the effects of music education on cognitive abilities has generated increasing interest across the scientific community. Nonetheless, longitudinal studies investigating the effects of structured music education on cognitive sub-functions are still rare. Prime candidates for investigating a relationship between academic achievement and music education appear to be executive functions such as planning, working memory, and inhibition.Methods: One hundred and forty-seven primary school children, Mage = 6.4 years, SD = 0.65 were followed for 2.5 years. Participants were randomized into four groups: two music intervention groups, one active visual arts group, and a no arts control group. Neuropsychological tests assessed verbal intelligence and executive functions. Additionally, a national pupil monitor provided data on academic performance.Results: Children in the visual arts group perform better on visuospatial memory tasks as compared to the three other conditions. However, the test scores on inhibition, planning and verbal intelligence increased significantly in the two music groups over time as compared to the visual art and no arts controls. Mediation analysis with executive functions and verbal IQ as mediator for academic performance have shown a possible far transfer effect from executive sub-function to academic performance scores.Discussion: The present results indicate a positive influence of long-term music education on cognitive abilities such as inhibition and planning. Of note, following a two-and-a-half year long visual arts program significantly improves scores on a visuospatial memory task. All results combined, this study supports a far transfer effect from music education to academic achievement mediated by executive sub-functions.

Formal string instrument training in a class setting enhances cognitive and sensorimotor development of primary school children

“…In order to appraise abstract reasoning, we applied the Matrices subtest of the WISC-IV (Wechsler, 2003). Since musical phrases develop over time according to musical grammar, like language (Patel, 2012), we consider that some abstract thinking is involved in producing and processing music (Jaschke, Honing, & Scherder, 2018b). The test consists of different sheets with series of three images (e.g.…”

“…The absence of significant effects for the for the three subtests of the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test may surprise, as increase of verbal memory and other language functions is reported often as an effect of musical training (Ho, Cheung, & Chan, 2003;Jaschke et al, 2018b;Roden et al, 2012). But we should acknowledge that 1) the control group was also musically trained, and sensitization to music did show a trend for verbal IQ (Jaschke et al, 2018a), 2) children in which verbal advantages were observed started musical training at a younger age on average than the groups tested in the current experiment (Ho et al, 2003;Jaschke et al, 2018b;Roden et al, 2012) and 3) that we did find a marginal positive effect of verbal learning in the OC group as compared to the Control Group, that may have failed to reach statistical significance following lack of statistical power as our groups are of medium size.…”

“…Finally a recent longitudinal study over 2.5 years (Jaschke et al, 2018b) compared young primary school children (mean age 6.4 years at the beginning of the interventions) following music and arts classes one or two times per…”

Promises of Music in Education?

“…In the Netherlands, 147 school children were followed for 2.5 years while pursuing in-school art projects (Jaschke et al, 2018). They were randomized into four groups: two music intervention groups, one visual arts group, and passive control group.…”

Influencia de la formación musical en el rendimiento académico: una revisión bibliográfica

“…Al realizar una pequeña investigación en la documentación científica actual, es fácil encontrar estudios donde la investigación en psicología y neurociencia comienza a preguntarse qué ocurre con estos niños y adolescentes que estudian música (Habibi, Damasio, Ilari, Sachs y Damasio, 2018;Habibi y cols., 2017;Moreno y cols., 2008). Los resultados, en su mayor parte positivos, demuestran que la formación musical en niños de edad escolar se asocia con una mejora de habilidades verbales y razonamiento general (Herrero y Carriedo, 2018;Jaschke, Honing y Scherder, 2018;Roden, Kreutz y Bongard, 2012). También es cierto que la ciencia avanza despacio y aún es difícil saber a qué nivel se producen estos cambios y la causa de los mismos (Miendlarzewska y cols., 2014).…”