Music and Language

This review presents a highly selective survey of connections between music and language. I begin by considering some fundamental differences between music and language and some nonspecific similarities that may arise out of more general characteristics of human cognition and communication. I then discuss an important, specific interaction between music and language: the connection between linguistic stress and musical meter. Next, I consider several possible connections that have been widely studied but remain controversial: cross-cultural correlations between linguistic and musical rhythm, effects of musical training on linguistic abilities, and connections in cognitive processing between music and linguistic syntax. Finally, I discuss some parallels regarding the use of repetition in music and language, which until now has been a little-explored topic.

Genetics, Molecular Control and Clinical Relevance of Habituation Learning

Habituation, the most ancient and fundamental form of learning, manifests already before birth. Neuroscientists have been fascinated for decades by its function as a firewall protecting our brains from sensory information overload and its indispensability for higher cognitive processing. Evidence that habituation learning is affected in autism and related monogenic neurodevelopmental syndromes and their animal models has exponentially grown, but the potential of this convergence to advance both fields is still largely unexploited.In this review, we provide a systematic overview of the genes that to date have been demonstrated to underlie habituation across species. We describe the biological processes they converge on, and highlight core regulatory pathways and repurposable drugs that may alleviate the habituation deficits associated with their dysregulation. We also summarize currently used habituation paradigms and extract the most important arguments from literature that support the crucial role of habituation for cognition in health and disease. We conclude that habituation is a powerful tool to overcome current bottlenecks in research, diagnostics and treatment of neurodevelopmental disorders.

Microstructural Impairments in a Topologically Distinct Prefrontal-Habenular Connection in Cocaine Addiction

Drug addiction is characterized by neuroadaptations in mesocorticolimbic networks regulating reward and inhibitory control. The habenula (Hb) is central to adaptive reward and aversion-driven behaviors, serving as a hub connecting emotion/cognitive processing regions including the prefrontal cortex (PFC). However, its role in human drug addiction has not been fully explored. Using diffusion tractography, we detailed PFC structural connectivity with three regions, namely the Hb, ventral tegmental area (VTA), and anterior thalamus (AT), and quantified the tract-specific microstructural integrity using diffusion tensor imaging within the anterior limb of the internal capsule (ALIC) in healthy and cocaine-addicted individuals. White matter microstructure in cocaine-addicted individuals was uniquely impaired in PFC-Hb projections in the ALIC, distinguishable from adjacent PFC-VTA and PFC-AT projections, with more pronounced abnormalities in short-term abstinence. These findings extend preclinical evidence of PFC-Hb circuit impairments in addiction and contextualize the plausible existence of a similar PFC-Hb connection in the human brain.

Local interactions between steady-state visually evoked potentials at nearby flickering frequencies

Steady-state visually evoked potentials (SSVEP) are widely used to index top-down cognitive processing in human electroencephalogram (EEG) studies. Typically, two stimuli flickering at different temporal frequencies (TFs) are presented, each producing a distinct response in the EEG at its flicker frequency. However, how SSVEP responses in EEG are modulated in the presence of a competing flickering stimulus just due to sensory interactions is not well understood. We have previously shown in local field potentials (LFP) recorded from awake monkeys that when two overlapping full screen gratings are counter-phased at different TFs, there is an asymmetric SSVEP response suppression, with greater suppression from lower TFs, which further depends on the relative orientations of the gratings (stronger suppression and asymmetry for parallel compared to orthogonal gratings). Here, we first confirmed these effects in both male and female human EEG recordings. Then, we mapped the response suppression of one stimulus (target) by a competing stimulus (mask) over a much wider range than the previous study. Surprisingly, we found that the suppression was not stronger at low frequencies in general, but systematically varied depending on the target TF, indicating local interactions between the two competing stimuli. These results were confirmed in both human EEG and monkey LFP and electrocorticogram (ECoG) data. Our results show that sensory interactions between multiple SSVEPs are more complex than shown previously and are influenced by both local and global factors, underscoring the need to cautiously interpret the results of studies involving SSVEP paradigms.

Affective disposition and cognitive processing in dysphoria: a time-frequency EEG study

To date, affective disposition and cognitive processing of emotional stimuli in individuals with depressive symptoms have not been fully explored within the same framework. Time-frequency analysis of electroencephalographic activity allows to disentangle the brain's parallel processing of information. The present study employed a time-frequency approach to simultaneously examine affective disposition and cognitive processing during the viewing of emotional stimuli in dysphoria. Time-frequency event-related changes were examined during the viewing of pleasant, neutral and unpleasant pictures in 24 individuals with dysphoria and 24 controls. Affective disposition was indexed by delta and alpha power, while theta power was employed as a correlate of cognitive elaboration of the stimuli. Cluster-based statistics revealed a centro-parietal reduction in delta power for pleasant stimuli in individuals with dysphoria than controls. Also, dysphoria was characterized by an early fronto-central increase in theta power for unpleasant stimuli relative to neutral and pleasant. Instead, controls were characterized by a late fronto-central and occipital reduction in theta power for unpleasant stimuli relative to neutral and pleasant. The present study granted novel insights on the interrelated facets of affective elaboration in dysphoria, mainly characterized by an hypoactivation of the approach-related motivational system and a sustained facilitated cognitive processing of unpleasant stimuli.

Listening Effort Informed Quality of Experience Evaluation

Perceived quality of experience for speech listening is influenced by cognitive processing and can affect a listener's comprehension, engagement and responsiveness. Quality of Experience (QoE) is a paradigm used within the media technology community to assess media quality by linking quantifiable media parameters to perceived quality. The established QoE framework provides a general definition of QoE, categories of possible quality influencing factors, and an identified QoE formation pathway. These assist researchers to implement experiments and to evaluate perceived quality for any applications. The QoE formation pathways in the current framework do not attempt to capture cognitive effort effects and the standard experimental assessments of QoE minimize the influence from cognitive processes. The impact of cognitive processes and how they can be captured within the QoE framework have not been systematically studied by the QoE research community. This article reviews research from the fields of audiology and cognitive science regarding how cognitive processes influence the quality of listening experience. The cognitive listening mechanism theories are compared with the QoE formation mechanism in terms of the quality contributing factors, experience formation pathways, and measures for experience. The review prompts a proposal to integrate mechanisms from audiology and cognitive science into the existing QoE framework in order to properly account for cognitive load in speech listening. The article concludes with a discussion regarding how an extended framework could facilitate measurement of QoE in broader and more realistic application scenarios where cognitive effort is a material consideration.

Suicidal ideation, self-injury, aggressive behavior and substance use during intensive trauma-focused treatment with exposure-based components in adolescent and young adult PTSD patients

Background Multiple traumata such as child sexual and/or physical abuse often result in complex psychopathologies and a range of associated dysfunctional behaviors. Although evidence-based interventions exist, some therapists are concerned that trauma-focused psychotherapy with exposure-based elements may lead to the deterioration of associated dysfunctional behaviors in adolescents and young adults. Therefore, we examined the course of suicidal ideation, self-injury, aggressive behavior and substance use in a group of abuse-related posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) patients during phase-based, trauma-focused PTSD treatment. Methods Daily assessments from a randomized controlled trial (RCT) of Developmentally adapted Cognitive Processing Therapy (D-CPT) were analyzed to test for differences in the stated dysfunctional behaviors between the four treatment phases. We conducted multilevel modeling and repeated measure ANOVAs. Results We did not find any significant differences between the treatment phases concerning the stated dysfunctional behaviors, either at the level of urge or at the level of actual actions. On the contrary, in some primary outcomes (self-injury, aggressive behavior), as well as secondary outcomes (distress caused by trauma, joy), we observed significant improvements. Discussion Overall, during D-CPT, adolescents and young adults showed no deterioration in dysfunctional behaviors, while even showing improvements in some, suggesting that trauma-focused treatment preceded by skills building was not deleterious to this population. Hence, the dissemination of effective interventions such as D-CPT should be fostered, whilst the concerns of the therapists regarding exposure-based components need to be addressed during appropriate training. Nevertheless, further studies with momentary assessment, extended measurement methods, a control group and larger sample sizes are needed to confirm our preliminary findings. Trial registration The trial was registered at the German Clinical Trial Registry (GCTR), DRKS00004787, 18 March 2013, https://www.drks.de/DRKS00004787.