The neural bases of familiar music listening in healthy individuals: An activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis

Existing neuroimaging studies on neural correlates of musical familiarity often employ a familiar vs. unfamiliar contrast analysis. This singular analytical approach reveals associations between explicit musical memory and musical familiarity. However, is the neural activity associated with musical familiarity solely related to explicit musical memory, or could it also be related to implicit musical memory? To address this, we presented 130 song excerpts of varying familiarity to 21 participants. While acquiring their brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we asked the participants to rate the familiarity of each song on a five-point scale. To comprehensively analyze the neural correlates of musical familiarity, we examined it from four perspectives: the intensity of local neural activity, patterns of local neural activity, global neural activity patterns, and functional connectivity. The results from these four approaches were consistent and revealed that musical familiarity is related to the activity of both explicit and implicit musical memory networks. Our findings suggest that: (1) musical familiarity is also associated with implicit musical memory, and (2) there is a cooperative and competitive interaction between the two types of musical memory in the perception of music.

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Elevated Activity in Left Homologous Music Circuits is Maladaptive for Music Perception but Mediated by Decoupled Structure and Function

Wang,

Jin,

Huyang

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Music is inherent in human life and is a significant topic of cognitive neuroscience. Previous studies focused on amusia suggested that two frontotemporal circuits engage in music processing. Structure-function coupling is an important feature of human brain, which is associated with cognition and allows for a more sensitive investigation of brain-behavior association. However, we still have limited knowledge about the relation between structure-function coupling, music processing and other regional neural profiles. We recruited 106 participants (43 subjects were diagnosed with congenital amusia) and measured their music perception by Montreal Battery of Evaluation of Amusia (MBEA). Then we utilized support vector regression algorithm and mediation analysis, and employed amplitude of low frequency fluctuation (ALFF), structural/functional degree centrality (DC) and structure-function coupling to explore their relation with global averaged MBEA score. We found structure-function coupling of widespread brain regions in both hemispheres, rather than ALFF or DC, contributed to predict MBEA score. Left middle frontal gyrus, bilateral inferior temporal gyrus and right insula were most predictive regions, and these regions were involved in memory and cognitive control according to meta-analysis. Further, coupling of left middle frontal gyrus, a region that is homologous to and is connected with typical music circuits, fully mediated the negative relation between ALFF and MBEA score. Our findings provide further understanding for the neural basis of music, and have implications for neural plasticity, neuromodulation therapy and cognitive causes of amusia.

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The neural bases of familiar music listening in healthy individuals: An activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis

Cited by 4 publications

References 161 publications

Music as a countermeasure to fatigue: A driving simulator study

Music as a countermeasure to fatigue: A driving simulator study

Neural correlates of musical familiarity: a functional magnetic resonance study

Elevated Activity in Left Homologous Music Circuits is Maladaptive for Music Perception but Mediated by Decoupled Structure and Function

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