Musical sophistication explains a good deal of cognitive performance. A cross-sectional study of musicians and non-musicians

Abstract

Musical sophistication is a psychometric construct that can be measured both in people with musical training and without training. Through backgrounds related to musical activities in their lifetime, and other indicators referring to their current events, the person’s musical sophistication can be estimated with a relatively high level of reliability (Cronbach’s α =.78). In turn, few studies have covered the relationships between variables of this type and cognitive performance, leaving an area of research with little evidence. This study explores the relationship between musical sophistication and cognition, taking a sample of 35 musicians and 35 non-musicians (N=70). The objective was to determine to what extent musical sophistication explains cognitive performance. The Ollen Musical Sophistication Index (Ollen 2006) was used to measure this variable, and a battery of tests enabled the measurement of cognitive performance, which considered verbal and visual-spatial working memory, inhibition, flexibility, a go/no-go test, processing speed, fluid intelligence, and divided attention. Exploratory factor analysis was run, showing two factors for cognition variables. Then regression analyses were run for factors 1 and 2, and both collapsed. The results show that 6 out of 8 cognitive variables correlate positively with musical sophistication, explaining 30% of cognitive performance, after controlling for demographic variables.

Learning to play a musical instrument in the middle school is associated with superior audiovisual working memory and fluid intelligence: A cross-sectional behavioral study

“…We would state that at least two of the three alternative hypotheses of the present study can be accepted: in one of them, we predicted the association between music training and superior audiovisual WM and fluid intelligence and, actually, the group of musicians showed a better performance compared to nonmusicians in both domains. The present results converge with prior studies where music training was associated with superior cognitive abilities (Schellenberg, 2006(Schellenberg, , 2011bDegé et al, 2011;Slevc et al, 2016;Baker et al, 2018;Meyer et al, 2020;Porflitt and Rosas, 2022).…”

Understanding the Association between Musical Sophistication and Well-Being in Music Students

“…The variables associated with academic performance are located on the axis of musical sophistication in the PCA. This may be consistent, to a degree at least, with the results of Porflitt and Rosas [ 15 , 62 ] in the Chilean context, who reported an association between OMSI result and executive functions. On the other hand, the independence of academic performance from scores in the university transition tests (PDT) and high school grades (NEM) is striking.…”

“…When those elements are not fulfilled, this may be reflected in problems of motivation and autonomy [ 42 , 43 ], as well as discomfort and frustration [ 44 ], which ultimately affect academic performance [ 45 ]. Previous research using self-reporting has shown that musical sophistication predicts visual, aural, and creative skills [ 8 ], as well as cognitive performance [ 15 ]. Thus, considering the theoretical background presented, in the present study we expected to find: That first year music students with poor musical backgrounds (measured through the OMSI) face greater difficulties in the educational transition process than their peers, from the perspective of the construct of well-being.…”

“…It has given rise to a significant number of related publications with considerable prevalence in music psychology literature. In Chile, which is the study context of the present research, it has been shown that the OMSI can predict cognitive performance in musicians and non-musicians, such as verbal working memory, fluid intelligence, processing speed, dividing attention, and cognitive inhibition [ 15 ].…”

“…Gonzalez-Sanchez et al [ 12 ] show, albeit with a very small sample, that musical skill (measured by the OMSI) can be predicted in cello and drum players by features of music performance, particularly smoothness of movement and the integration of sequential movements into single units (coarticulation), a skill related to music anticipation. In the Chilean context, the OMSI questionnaire was translated into Spanish [ 15 ] with a resulting estimate of Cronbach’s alpha = 0.77. The original data [ 5 ] showed similar reliability (=0.78).…”