Musical instrument engagement in adolescence predicts verbal ability 4 years later: A twin and adoption study.

2021 ◽  
Vol 57 (11) ◽  
pp. 1943-1957
Author(s):  
Daniel E. Gustavson ◽  
Naomi P. Friedman ◽  
Michael C. Stallings ◽  
Chandra A. Reynolds ◽  
Hilary Coon ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Adoption Study

Musical Instrument Engagement in Adolescence Predicts Verbal Ability Four Years Later: A Twin and Adoption Study

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel E. Gustavson ◽  
Naomi P. Friedman ◽  
Michael Stallings ◽  
Chandra Reynolds ◽  
Hilary Coon ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Aging ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Structural Equation Models ◽  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Language Abilities ◽  
Adoption Study ◽  
Direct Benefits ◽  
Biological Etiology ◽  
The Relationship

Individual differences in music traits are heritable and correlated with the development of cognitive and communication skills, but little is known about whether diverse modes of music engagement (e.g., playing instruments vs. singing) reflect similar underlying genetic/environmental influences. Moreover, the biological etiology underlying the relationship between musicality and childhood language development is poorly understood. Here we explored genetic and environmental associations between music engagement and verbal ability in the Colorado Adoption/Twin Study of Lifespan behavioral development and cognitive aging (CATSLife) project. N=1684 adolescents completed measures of music engagement and intelligence at approximately age 12 and/or multiple tests of verbal ability at age 16. Structural equation models revealed that instrument engagement was highly heritable (a2=.78), with moderate heritabilities for singing (a2=.43) and dance engagement (a2=.66). Adolescent self-perceived instrument engagement (but not singing or dance engagement) was genetically correlated with age 12 verbal intelligence, and still was associated with age 16 verbal ability even when controlling for age 12 full-scale intelligence, providing evidence for a longitudinal relationship between music engagement and language beyond shared general cognitive processes. Together, these novel findings suggest that shared genetic influences in part accounts for phenotypic associations between music engagement and language, but there may also be some (weak) direct benefits of music engagement on later language abilities.

Nature, Nurture, and Cognitive Development from 1 to 16 Years: A Parent-Offspring Adoption Study

1997 ◽  
Vol 8 (6) ◽  
pp. 442-447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Plomin ◽  
David W. Fulker ◽  
Robin Corley ◽  
John C DeFries
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Development ◽  
Cognitive Ability ◽  
Middle Childhood ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Adoptive Parents ◽  
Childhood And Adolescence ◽  
Adopted Children ◽  
Adoption Study ◽  
Biological Parents

Children increasingly resemble their parents in cognitive abilities from infancy through adolescence Results obtained from a 20-year longitudinal adoption study of 245 adopted children and their biological and adoptive parents, as well as 245 matched nonadoptive (control) parents and offspring, show that this increasing resemblance is due to genetic factors Adopted children resemble their adoptive parents slightly in early childhood but not at all in middle childhood or adolescence In contrast, during childhood and adolescence, adopted children become more like their biological parents, and to the same degree as children and parents in control families Although these results were strongest for general cognitive ability and verbal ability similar results were found for other specific cognitive abilities—spatial ability, speed of processing, and recognition memory These findings indicate that within this population, genes that stably affect cognitive abilities in adulthood do not all come into play until adolescence and that environmental factors that contribute to cognitive development are not correlated with parents' cognitive ability

The Sequenced Inventory of Communication Development: An Adoption Study of Two and Three-year olds

1988 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-231 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. A. Thompson ◽  
Robert Plomin
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Ability ◽  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Adopted Children ◽  
General Cognitive Ability ◽  
Adoption Study ◽  
Communication Development ◽  
Biological Mothers ◽  
Sibling Correlations ◽  
Communicative Development ◽  
Using Data

The etiology of individual differences in communicative development is explored using data from 226 adoptive and 224 nonadoptive families in the Colorado Adoption Project. Scores from the Sequenced Inventory of Communication Development (SICD) (Hedrick, Prather, & Tobin, 1975) in 2-and 3-year-old children are compared to concurrent and longitudinal measures of verbal and general cognitive ability and to verbal and general cognitive ability in their parents. Sibling correlations for the SICD and cross-correlations for the SICD and I.Q. in related and unrelated pairs are also examined. Sibling correlations indicate that performance on the SICD is genetically influenced and that the relationship between the SICD and I.Q. at 2 and 3 years of age is in part genetically mediated. At 2 and 3 years of age, SICD scores are related to parental intelligence and verbal ability and this relationship is partially determined by family environmental factors at both ages. At 3 years of age, the SICD scores of adopted children correlates significantly with their biological mothers' general cognitive ability.

scholarly journals Practicing a Musical Instrument in Childhood is Associated with Enhanced Verbal Ability and Nonverbal Reasoning

PLoS ONE ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 3 (10) ◽  
pp. e3566 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie Forgeard ◽  
Ellen Winner ◽  
Andrea Norton ◽  
Gottfried Schlaug
Keyword(s):  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Nonverbal Reasoning

Musical Experience Shapes Neural Processing

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 81-86
Author(s):  
Wido Nager ◽  
Tilla Franke ◽  
Tobias Wagner-Altendorf ◽  
Eckart Altenmüller ◽  
Thomas F. Münte
Keyword(s):  
Mismatch Negativity ◽  
Pure Tone ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Active Listening ◽  
Musical Experience ◽  
Neural Processing ◽  
Neural Adaptations

Abstract. Playing a musical instrument professionally has been shown to lead to structural and functional neural adaptations, making musicians valuable subjects for neuroplasticity research. Here, we follow the hypothesis that specific musical demands further shape neural processing. To test this assumption, we subjected groups of professional drummers, professional woodwind players, and nonmusicians to pure tone sequences and drum sequences in which infrequent anticipations of tones or drum beats had been inserted. Passively listening to these sequences elicited a mismatch negativity to the temporally deviant stimuli which was greater in the musicians for tone series and particularly large for drummers for drum sequences. In active listening conditions drummers more accurately and more quickly detected temporally deviant stimuli.

Influence of General and Crystallized Intelligence on Vocabulary Test Performance

2002 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 78-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eva Ullstadius ◽  
Jan-Eric Gustafsson ◽  
Berit Carlstedt
Keyword(s):  
Hierarchical Model ◽  
Test Performance ◽  
Verbal Ability ◽  
Testing Procedure ◽  
Intellectual Ability ◽  
Analysis Of Covariance ◽  
Categorical Variables ◽  
Vocabulary Test ◽  
Crystallized Intelligence ◽  
General Ability

Summary: Vocabulary tests, part of most test batteries of general intellectual ability, measure both verbal and general ability. Newly developed techniques for confirmatory factor analysis of dichotomous variables make it possible to analyze the influence of different abilities on the performance on each item. In the testing procedure of the Computerized Swedish Enlistment test battery, eight different subtests of a new vocabulary test were given randomly to subsamples of a representative sample of 18-year-old male conscripts (N = 9001). Three central dimensions of a hierarchical model of intellectual abilities, general (G), verbal (Gc'), and spatial ability (Gv') were estimated under different assumptions of the nature of the data. In addition to an ordinary analysis of covariance matrices, assuming linearity of relations, the item variables were treated as categorical variables in the Mplus program. All eight subtests fit the hierarchical model, and the items were found to load about equally on G and Gc'. The results also indicate that if nonlinearity is not taken into account, the G loadings for the easy items are underestimated. These items, moreover, appear to be better measures of G than the difficult ones. The practical utility of the outcome for item selection and the theoretical implications for the question of the origin of verbal ability are discussed.

The role of verbal ability in promoting the development of self-regulation skills in preschoolers attending Head Start

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Wagner Fuhs ◽  
Jeanne Day ◽  
Autumn Wyant
Keyword(s):  
Head Start ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Verbal Ability

Access to a musical instrument tops the list of predictors of academic achievement across SES

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura N. Young ◽  
Sara Cordes ◽  
Ellen Winner
Keyword(s):  
Academic Achievement ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Predictors Of Academic Achievement
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