scholarly journals How does music training predict cognitive abilities? A bifactor approach to musical expertise and intelligence.

2016 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 184-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul J. Silvia ◽  
Karen S. Thomas ◽  
Emily C. Nusbaum ◽  
Roger E. Beaty ◽  
Donald A. Hodges
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Musical Expertise

scholarly journals Age and Musical Expertise Influence Emotion Recognition in Music

2014 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
São Luís Castro ◽  
César F. Lima
Keyword(s):  
Personality Traits ◽  
Emotion Recognition ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Recognition Accuracy ◽  
Individual Variability ◽  
Middle Aged ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Age Cohorts ◽  
Musical Expertise ◽  
Middle Aged Adults

We investigated how age and musical expertise influence emotion recognition in music. Musically trained and untrained participants from two age cohorts, young and middle-aged adults (N = 80), were presented with music excerpts expressing happiness, peacefulness, sadness, and fear/threat. Participants rated how much each excerpt expressed the four emotions on 10-point scales. The intended emotions were consistently perceived, but responses varied across groups. Advancing age was associated with selective decrements in the recognition of sadness and fear/threat, a finding consistent with previous research (Lima & Castro, 2011a); the recognition of happiness and peacefulness remained stable. Years of music training were associated with enhanced recognition accuracy. These effects were independent of domain-general cognitive abilities and personality traits, but they were echoed in differences in how efficiently music structural cues (e.g., tempo, mode) were relied upon. Thus, age and musical expertise are experiential factors explaining individual variability in emotion recognition in music.

Music Training and Nonmusical Abilities: Introduction

2011 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Glenn Schellenberg ◽  
Ellen Winner
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Scientific Inquiry ◽  
Music Perception ◽  
Music Training ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
Academic Benefits ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Media ◽  
New Research

the objective of this special issue of Music Perception, which includes contributions from researchers based in Canada, Germany, New Zealand, and the US, is to present the best new research on associations between music training and nonmusical abilities. Scholarly interest in associations between music training and nonmusical cognitive functioning has sparked much research over the past 15–20 years. The study of how far associations between music training and cognitive abilities extend, and whether such associations are more likely for some domains of cognition than for others, has theoretical relevance for issues of transfer, modularity, and plasticity. Unlike most other areas of scientific inquiry, there is parallel interest on the part of the public, the media, and educators who want to know if nonmusical intellectual and academic benefits are a welcome by-product of sending children to music lessons. Indeed, some educators and arts advocates justify music training in schools precisely because of these presumed and desired nonmusical associations.

Memory for Verbal and Visual Material in Highly Trained Musicians

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorna S. Jakobson ◽  
Samantha T. Lewycky ◽  
Andrea R. Kilgour ◽  
Brenda M. Stoesz
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Visual Memory ◽  
Music Instruction ◽  
Group Differences ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Delayed Recall ◽  
Semantic Clustering ◽  
List Learning ◽  
Delayed Recognition ◽  
Initial List

INTEREST IN STUDYING THE EFFECTS of extensive music training on nonmusical perceptual and cognitive abilities has grown in recent years. Here, we present evidence that formal music instruction is associated with superior verbal and visual memory. Participants included 15 highly trained pianists and 21 individuals with little or no formal music training. The groups were comparable in terms of age, gender distribution, and socioeconomic status. Musicians showed superior immediate and delayed recall of word lists and greater use of a semantic clustering strategy during initial list-learning than nonmusicians. They also exhibited superior learning, delayed recall, and delayed recognition for visual designs. Group differences in delayed free recall of both words and designs persisted after controlling statistically for estimated Full Scale IQ. These results suggest that extensive music training is associated with a generalized enhancement of auditory and visual memory functions.

scholarly journals The definition of a musician in music psychology: A literature review and the six-year rule

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 389-409 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Diana Zhang ◽  
Marco Susino ◽  
Gary E. McPherson ◽  
Emery Schubert
Keyword(s):  
Literature Review ◽  
Comparative Studies ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Research Papers ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Music Psychology ◽  
General Consensus ◽  
Musical Expertise ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Practice Time

The aim of this paper was to investigate if a general consensus could be established for the term “musician.” Research papers ( N = 730) published between 2011 and 2017 were searched. Of these, 95 papers were identified as investigating relationships of any sort connected with a musician-like category ( e.g., comparison of musically trained vs. non-musically trained people), of which 39 papers detailing comparative studies exclusively between musicians and non-musicians were analyzed. Within this literature, a variety of musical expertise criteria were used to define musicians, with years of music training (51% of papers) and years of music lessons (13% of papers) being the most commonly used criteria. Findings confirm a general consensus in the literature, namely, that a musician, whether or not selected a priori, has at least six years of musical expertise (IQR = 4.0–10.0 years). Other factors such as practice time and recruiting location of musicians were also analyzed, as well as the implications of how this definition fits in relation to the complexities surrounding the construct of the musician. The “six-year rule,” however, was robust overall.

Associations between two measures of music aptitude: Are the IMMA and the AMMA significantly correlated in a sample of 9- to 13-year-old children?

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 465-478 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franziska Degé ◽  
Hanne Patscheke ◽  
Gudrun Schwarzer
Keyword(s):  
Socioeconomic Status ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Structural Model ◽  
Music Aptitude ◽  
Control Variables ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Aptitude Tests ◽  
Musical Aptitude ◽  
Music Audiation ◽  
Two Measures

The aim of this study was to correlate musical aptitude scores derived from two tests based on the same structural model for musical aptitude in a sample of 9- to 13-year-old children. We controlled for the influences of socioeconomic status (SES; measured by parents’ education), the amount of music lessons, and general cognitive abilities (i.e., IQ). The sample comprised 89 (46 girls) 9- to 13-year-old children. We applied two different tests by Edwin Gordon: Intermediate Measures of Music Audiation (IMMA) and Advanced Measures of Music Audiation (AMMA) to measure musical aptitude. As control variables, IQ, socioeconomic status, and amount of music training were assessed. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis revealed that the total score of the IMMA together with the control variables could not predict the total score of the AMMA. Furthermore, regression models for each of the subtests were also not significant. With respect to the control variables, we revealed an association between the IMMA and socioeconomic status as well as amount of music training. We conclude that even tests that are based on the same structural model of musical aptitude were not associated significantly. This might indicate problems of validity. Additionally, it seems to be difficult to assess musical aptitude independently of influences from music training and SES. Ultimately, this may support the notion that we still need valid musical aptitude tests for this particular age group.

Music Training

2019 ◽  
pp. 487-507
Author(s):  
Brooke M. Okada ◽  
L. Robert Slevc
Keyword(s):  
Executive Function ◽  
Training Program ◽  
Cognitive Training ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Small Body ◽  
Strong Relationship ◽  
Musical Experience ◽  
Music Learning ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Intrinsic Rewards

This chapter focuses on the possibility that music training could serve as a type of cognitive training. Music is an interesting potential avenue for cognitive training not only because music learning and processing are likely to draw heavily on executive function abilities, but also because musical experience has its own intrinsic rewards. This suggests that music training might serve as a particularly enjoyable and rewarding route to cognitive training. The authors describe some theoretical reasons to expect a strong relationship between executive function and music, describe the small body of work that has experimentally assessed the possibility that musical experience might transfer to executive function abilities, and finally recommend ways in which a music training program might strengthen cognitive abilities.

Music Training and Cognitive Abilities: Associations, Causes, and Consequences

2018 ◽  
pp. 644-670 ◽  
Author(s):  
Swathi Swaminathan ◽  
E. Glenn Schellenberg
Keyword(s):  
Academic Achievement ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Healthy Aging ◽  
Music Aptitude ◽  
Listening Skills ◽  
Rhythm Perception ◽  
Language Abilities ◽  
Music Training ◽  
Visuospatial Abilities ◽  
The One

This chapter evaluates the evidence that music training leads to improved cognitive abilities. It considers whether music training is associated with measures of general cognitive abilities, visuospatial abilities, and language abilities, as well as with real-world measures such as academic achievement and healthy aging. Although positive associations with music training are evident in each instance, causal evidence is lacking, inconsistent, or weak. The one exception appears to be specialized music training that focuses on listening skills and rhythm perception, which seems to improve listening skills more generally. Improved phonological awareness can, in turn, lead to improvements in reading, particularly for young children who are beginning to read, or for children with dyslexia. Otherwise, associations with music training appear to be the consequence of individual differences in demographics, personality, music aptitude, and cognitive ability, which influence who takes music lessons, particularly for extended durations of time.

scholarly journals Musical expertise is associated with improved neural statistical learning

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacques Pesnot Lerousseau ◽  
Daniele Schön
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Learning ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Bayesian Model ◽  
Musical Training ◽  
Sensory Information ◽  
P300 Amplitude ◽  
Musical Expertise ◽  
Multiple Trials ◽  
Eeg Recordings ◽  
Fine Tune

AbstractIt is poorly known whether musical training leads to improvements in general cognitive abilities, such as statistical learning (SL). In standard SL paradigms, musicians have better performances than non-musicians. However, these better performances could be due to an improved ability to process sensory information, as opposed to an improved ability to learn sequence statistics. Unfortunately, these very different explanations make similar predictions on the performances averaged over multiple trials. To solve this controversy, we developed a Bayesian model and recorded electroencephalography (EEG) to study trial-by-trial responses. Our results confirm that musicians perform ~15% better than non-musicians at predicting items in auditory sequences that embed either simple or complex statistics. This higher performance is explained in the Bayesian model by parameters governing SL, as opposed to parameters governing sensory information processing. EEG recordings reveal a neural underpinning of the musician’s advantage: the P300 amplitude correlates with the Bayesian model surprise elicited by each item, and so, more strongly for musicians than non-musicians. Finally, early EEG components correlate with the Bayesian model surprise elicited by simple statistics, as opposed to late EEG components that correlate with Bayesian model surprise elicited by complex statistics surprise, and so more strongly for musicians than non-musicians. Overall, our results prove that musical expertise is associated with improved neural SL, and support music-based intervention to fine tune general cognitive abilities.

The Effects of Music Training on Cognitive Abilities

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 419
Author(s):  
Hang WANG ◽  
Jun JIANG ◽  
Cunmei JIANG
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Music Training
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