The dorsal auditory pathway is involved in performance of both visual and auditory rhythms

Visual rhythm perception improves through auditory but not visual training

“…Our findings are consistent with late stage perceptual learning and enrich this conversation by showing that, in some cases, perceptual processing and perceptual learning may depend on representations that are not native to the task but that are instead 'outsourced' (for example, crossmodal read-out of visual representations by systems that are also read-out auditory representations). This possibility is in line with research indicating that temporal information may be automatically encoded by the auditory modality, even when that information is delivered via the visual modality [9,10]. For instance, Kanai et al [10] found that disrupting auditory cortex via transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) resulted in deficits in temporal judgments (that is, duration discrimination) in both the auditory and visual modalities, whereas applying TMS to visual cortex interfered with visual, but not auditory, temporal judgments [10].…”

Altered effective connectivity and anomalous anatomy in the basal ganglia-thalamocortical circuit of stuttering speakers

“…This connection is supported by the evidence that the basal ganglia-thalamus is anatomically connected with the temporal cortex (e.g., Behrens et al, 2003;Leh et al, 2007;Middleton and Strick, 1996). Moreover, functional connections also exist because the posterior temporal cortex as well as the SMA and basal ganglia have been found to be involved in auditory-motor representations and temporal sequence control of movement regardless of the modality (Karabanov et al, 2009;Kimura et al, 2008;Remy et al, 2008). The present SEM results showed a significantly stronger projection from the basal ganglia-thalamus to the PMTG in stuttering speakers than in non-stuttering speakers.…”

Modality effects in rhythm processing: Auditory encoding of visual rhythms is neither obligatory nor automatic

“…The possibility of an auditory recoding of visually presented rhythms was also recently considered by Karabanov, Blom, Forsman, and Ullén (2009). In this study, the focus was on brain activity associated with reproduction of rhythms that were learned prior to scanning in either the auditory or the visual modality.…”