Search

Background: Older adults can acquire new skills across different domains. Practicing a musical instrument has been identified as a promising activity for improving cognition, promoting well-being, and inducing brain plasticity in older individuals. However, the mechanisms of these changes are still poorly understood. This study aims to assess musical skill acquisition in musically naïve older adults over one year of practice, focusing on individual factors influencing this process and the relations between musical skills., Methods: One hundred fifty-six healthy older adults (age = 69.5 years ± 3.2) from Hannover and Geneva with no prior musical training participated in weekly piano practice (PP) or 'music culture' (MC) sessions over a one-year period. Baseline assessments included the Cognitive Reserve Index questionnaire (CRIq) and Cognitive Telephone Screening Instrument (CogTel). Musical abilities were measured using piano performance ratings (PP group), music quizzes (MC group), and aptitude tests such as the Beat Alignment Test (BAT), Melodic Discrimination Test (MDT) and Midi Scale Analysis (MSA) at baseline and six-, twelve and 18-month timepoints. The interrelationship between musical abilities was investigated through correlational analyses, and changes impacted through individual characteristics were modeled using Bayesian statistics., Results: The PP group demonstrated moderate improvements in piano articulation and dynamics, while the MC group achieved higher scores in the music quiz. Modest improvements in MDT and MSA were observed in both groups, with the PP group showing greater progress is MSA. Higher global cognitive functioning and musical sophistication was associated with greater performance in MDT for both groups. We did not identify any links between individual characteristics, like age, CogTel, CRIq, and musical sophistication, and improvement in musical aptitude tests. Changes in different musical aptitude test scores were not correlated, and neither the development of piano skills nor the music quiz correlated with initial performances on the musical aptitude tests., Conclusion: Musically naïve older adults can acquire diverse musical abilities, which progress independently, suggesting a broad spectrum of musical abilities rather than a single general musical aptitude. Future research should also explore genetic and psychosocial factors influencing musical development., Trial Registration: The Ethikkomission of the Leibniz Universität Hannover approved the protocol on 14.08.17 (no. 3604-2017), the neuroimaging part and blood sampling was approved by the Hannover Medical School on 07.03.18. The full protocol was approved by the Commission cantonale d'éthique de la recherche de Genève (no. 2016-02224) on 27.02.18 and registered at clinicaltrials.gov on 17.09.18 (NCT03674931, no. 81185)., Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: The study was approved by the Research Ethics Review Committee of Leibniz University Hannover and the Ethics Committee of Hannover Medical School (number 3604–2017) as well as the Cantonal Ethics Committee of Geneva (number 2016–02224). Participants provided written informed consent and were free to withdraw from the study at any time. Consent for publication: All participants signed a declaration of informed consent to participate in the study and accepted by their signature that the obtained data could be used for publication, under the condition that data will remain anonymous. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

We analyzed the data of a randomized controlled trial to examine the effects of piano practice on cognitive flexibility in healthy older adults. Participants ( N = 153, 69.5 ± 3.5 years of age, 57.5% females) were randomly assigned to a piano practice group (PP) or a control group engaged in active music listening (MC). Both groups underwent a year-long intervention with weekly 60-min lessons and daily homework. We assessed switch and mixing costs in terms of speed (mean reaction times) and variability (standard deviation of reaction times) with a number switch and a perceptual switch task. We employed scale analysis based on musical instrument digital interface to assess pianistic performance. Tests were conducted at baseline, after 6 months, postintervention (12 months), and at follow-up (18 months). Results revealed more pronounced improvements in pianistic performance in the PP group compared with the MC group over the course of the intervention. Both groups exhibited gains in several cognitive flexibility outcomes, which originated primarily in the latter half of the intervention. For mixing costs of the number switch test, the PP group showed greater improvements compared with the MC group. Changes in pianistic performance were not related to changes in cognitive flexibility. Additionally, the findings indicated a compensation account in both groups, which was more pronounced in the PP group for mixing costs. This study suggests that both piano practice and active music listening-with piano practice to a higher degree-enhance cognitive flexibility, particularly in sustained control mechanisms linked to mixing costs. Both interventions potentially require longer than 6 months to induce behavioral transfer effects and are especially beneficial for individuals with lower cognitive flexibility levels. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

The acquisition of skills, such as learning to play a musical instrument, involves various phases that make specific demands on the learner. Knowledge of the cognitive and motor contributions during learning phases can be helpful in developing effective and targeted interventions for healthy aging. Eighty-six healthy older participants underwent an extensive cognitive, motoric, and musical test battery. Within one session, one piano-related and one music-independent movement sequence were both learned. We tested the associations between skill performance and cognito-motor abilities with Bayesian mixed models accounting for individual learning rates. Results showed that performance was positively associated with all cognito-motor abilities. Learning a piano-related task was characterized by relatively strong initial associations between performance and abilities. These associations then weakened considerably before increasing exponentially from the second trial onwards, approaching a plateau. Similar performance-ability relationships were detected in the course of learning a music-unrelated motor task. Positive performance-ability associations emphasize the potential of learning new skills to produce positive cognitive and motor transfer effects. Consistent high-performance tasks that demand maximum effort from the participants could be very effective. However, interventions should be sufficiently long so that the transfer potential can be fully exploited.

Learning to play an instrument at an advanced age may help to counteract or slow down age-related cognitive decline. However, studies investigating the neural underpinnings of these effects are still scarce. One way to investigate the effects of brain plasticity is using resting-state functional connectivity (FC). The current study compared the effects of learning to play the piano (PP) against participating in music listening/musical culture (MC) lessons on FC in 109 healthy older adults. Participants underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging at three time points: at baseline, and after 6 and 12 months of interventions. Analyses revealed piano training-specific FC changes after 12 months of training. These include FC increase between right Heschl's gyrus (HG), and other right dorsal auditory stream regions. In addition, PP showed an increased anticorrelation between right HG and dorsal posterior cingulate cortex and FC increase between the right motor hand area and a bilateral network of predominantly motor-related brain regions, which positively correlated with fine motor dexterity improvements. We suggest to interpret those results as increased network efficiency for auditory-motor integration. The fact that functional neuroplasticity can be induced by piano training in healthy older adults opens new pathways to countervail age related decline., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Musical training can improve fine motor skills and cognitive abilities and induce macrostructural brain changes. However, it is not clear whether the changes in motor skills occur simultaneously with changes in cognitive and neurophysiological parameters. In this study, 156 healthy, musically naïve and right-handed older adults were recruited and randomly assigned to a piano training or a music listening group. Before, after 6 and 12 months, participants were scanned using MRI and assessed for fine motor skills, auditory working memory and processing speed. A Bayesian multilevel modelling approach was used to examine behavioural and neurophysiological group differences. The relationships between motor and cognitive and between motor and neurophysiological parameters were determined using latent change score models. Compared with music listening, practicing piano resulted in greater improvement in fine motor skills and probably working memory. Only in the piano group, unimanual fine motor skills and grey matter volume of the contralateral M1 changed together during the 6-12-month period. Additionally, M1 co-developed with ipsilateral putamen and thalamus. Playing piano induced more prevalent coupling between the motor and cognitive domains. However, there is little evidence that fine motor control develops concurrently with cognitive functions. Playing an instrument promotes motor, cognitive and neural development into older age. During the learning process, the consolidation of piano skills appears to take place in sensorimotor networks, enabling musicians to perform untrained motor tasks with higher acuity. Relationships between the development of motor acuity and cognition were bidirectional and can be explained by a common cause as well as by shared resources with compensatory mechanisms., (© 2023 The Authors. European Journal of Neuroscience published by Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Introduction: During their career, musicians need to undergo intense periods of training to master musical instruments and become accomplished artists. Dysfunctional practice behaviors and anxiety are often mentioned among the possible risk factors for playing-related injuries in musicians. However, the mechanism through which these might lead to the onset of these injuries is still unclear. The present study aims at overcoming this limitation by investigating the relationship between quantitative measurements of anxiety, practice behaviors and music performance quality., Methods: The experiment consisted in monitoring practice behaviors in 30 pianists practicing a short musical task., Results: Most self-report anxiety measurements were positively correlated with practice time, especially those collected right before the practice sessions. Similar correlations were identified between anxiety and the number of repetitions of the musical task. Physiological markers of anxiety were only weakly related to practice behaviors. Subsequent analyses showed that high levels of anxiety were associated with poor quality of music performances at baseline. Nevertheless, the interaction between participants' learning rate and anxiety measures showed no association with performance quality scores. Moreover, anxiety and performance quality co-developed during practice sessions, showing that pianists who improved their playing were also less anxious in the latter part of the experiment., Discussion: These findings suggest that anxious musicians are likely at higher risk of developing playing-related injuries related to overuse and repetitive strains. Future directions and clinical implications are discussed., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2023 Passarotto, Worschech and Altenmüller.)

Morphological differences in the auditory brain of musicians compared to nonmusicians are often associated with life-long musical activity. Cross-sectional studies, however, do not allow for any causal inferences, and most experimental studies testing music-driven adaptations investigated children. Although the importance of the age at which musical training begins is widely recognized to impact neuroplasticity, there have been few longitudinal studies examining music-related changes in the brains of older adults. Using magnetic resonance imaging, we measured cortical thickness (CT) of 12 auditory-related regions of interest before and after 6 months of musical instruction in 134 healthy, right-handed, normal-hearing, musically-naive older adults (64-76 years old). Prior to the study, all participants were randomly assigned to either piano training or to a musical culture/music listening group. In five regions-left Heschl's gyrus, left planum polare, bilateral superior temporal sulcus, and right Heschl's sulcus-we found an increase in CT in the piano training group compared with the musical culture group. Furthermore, CT of the right Heschl's gyrus could be identified as a morphological substrate supporting speech in noise perception. The results support the conclusion that playing an instrument is an effective stimulator for cortical plasticity, even in older adults., (© 2022 The Authors. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of New York Academy of Sciences.)

While aging is characterized by neurodegeneration, musical training is associated with experience-driven brain plasticity and protection against age-related cognitive decline. However, evidence for the positive effects of musical training mostly comes from cross-sectional studies while randomized controlled trials with larger sample sizes are rare. The current study compares the influence of six months of piano training with music listening/musical culture lessons in 121 musically naïve healthy elderly individuals with regard to white matter properties using fixel-based analysis. Analyses revealed a significant fiber density decline in the music listening/musical culture group (but not in the piano group), after six months, in the fornix, which is a white matter tract that naturally declines with age. In addition, these changes in fiber density positively correlated to episodic memory task performances and the amount of weekly piano training. These findings not only provide further evidence for the involvement of the fornix in episodic memory encoding but also more importantly show that learning to play the piano at an advanced age may stabilize white matter microstructure of the fornix., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Jünemann, Marie, Worschech, Scholz, Grouiller, Kliegel, Van De Ville, James, Krüger, Altenmüller and Sinke.)

Understanding speech in background noise poses a challenge in daily communication, which is a particular problem among the elderly. Although musical expertise has often been suggested to be a contributor to speech intelligibility, the associations are mostly correlative. In the present multisite study conducted in Germany and Switzerland, 156 healthy, normal-hearing elderly were randomly assigned to either piano playing or music listening/musical culture groups. The speech reception threshold was assessed using the International Matrix Test before and after a 6 month intervention. Bayesian multilevel modeling revealed an improvement of both groups over time under binaural conditions. Additionally, the speech reception threshold of the piano group decreased during stimuli presentation to the left ear. A right ear improvement only occurred in the German piano group. Furthermore, improvements were predominantly found in women. These findings are discussed in the light of current neuroscientific theories on hemispheric lateralization and biological sex differences. The study indicates a positive transfer from musical training to speech processing, probably supported by the enhancement of auditory processing and improvement of general cognitive functions., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Worschech, Marie, Jünemann, Sinke, Krüger, Großbach, Scholz, Abdili, Kliegel, James and Altenmüller.)

Background: Music has been used as agent in medicine for decades. The applications of music in health span from music therapy to music listening interventions to mere music listening. Music may reduce stress and improve health in people living with dementia (PwD), but the exact underpinnings of these effects are unclear. It is proposed that beneficial effects of music are mediated by a reduction in psychobiological stress. Therefore, the present review aims to shed light on the potential psychobiological mechanisms underlying the health-beneficial effects of music in PwD., Methods: We searched for studies investigating health-beneficial effects of music in PwD by means of psychobiological stress measures using the PubMed, PsycINFO and Web of Science databases and by hand-searching., Results: The inclusion criteria were met by 12 studies. Seven of the included studies investigated effects of music therapy on the autonomic nervous system (ANS), the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis or the immune system in patients with mild to moderate dementia. Results showed decreased ANS activity as measured by heart rate variability but no effect on alpha-amylase. Effects on blood pressure were mixed. Concerning the secretion of cortisol, one study found decreased HPA axis activity whereas two studies found no significant effects. No effects were found on salivary immunoglobin A. Three studies investigated the effects of music listening interventions in patients with severe dementia by means of predominantly ANS parameters with evidence indicating increased parasympathetic activation after music listening. Two studies investigated the effects of mere music listening on skin conductance using experimental designs. One study found increases in arousal due to music listening, whereas the other study found no effect., Discussion and Conclusion: These very preliminary results indicate effects of music on central stress pathways in PwD, but also highlight the need for further research focussing on a comprehensive assessment of autonomic, endocrine and immunological parameters in response to music. Furthermore, future studies should directly compare music therapy to music listening interventions and mere music listening in samples of PwD of varying disease severity and varying care settings., (Copyright © 2021. Published by Elsevier Inc.)

Background: Recent data suggest that musical practice prevents age-related cognitive decline. But experimental evidence remains sparse and no concise information on the neurophysiological bases exists, although cognitive decline represents a major impediment to healthy aging. A challenge in the field of aging is developing training regimens that stimulate neuroplasticity and delay or reverse symptoms of cognitive and cerebral decline. To be successful, these regimens should be easily integrated in daily life and intrinsically motivating. This study combines for the first-time protocolled music practice in elderly with cutting-edge neuroimaging and behavioral approaches, comparing two types of musical education., Methods: We conduct a two-site Hannover-Geneva randomized intervention study in altogether 155 retired healthy elderly (64-78) years, (63 in Geneva, 92 in Hannover), offering either piano instruction (experimental group) or musical listening awareness (control group). Over 12 months all participants receive weekly training for 1 hour, and exercise at home for ~ 30 min daily. Both groups study different music styles. Participants are tested at 4 time points (0, 6, and 12 months & post-training (18 months)) on cognitive and perceptual-motor aptitudes as well as via wide-ranging functional and structural neuroimaging and blood sampling., Discussion: We aim to demonstrate positive transfer effects for faculties traditionally described to decline with age, particularly in the piano group: executive functions, working memory, processing speed, abstract thinking and fine motor skills. Benefits in both groups may show for verbal memory, hearing in noise and subjective well-being. In association with these behavioral benefits we anticipate functional and structural brain plasticity in temporal (medial and lateral), prefrontal and parietal areas and the basal ganglia. We intend exhibiting for the first time that musical activities can provoke important societal impacts by diminishing cognitive and perceptual-motor decline supported by functional and structural brain plasticity., Trial Registration: The Ethikkomission of the Leibniz Universität Hannover approved the protocol on 14.08.17 (no. 3604-2017), the neuroimaging part and blood sampling was approved by the Hannover Medical School on 07.03.18. The full protocol was approved by the Commission cantonale d'éthique de la recherche de Genève (no. 2016-02224) on 27.02.18 and registered at clinicaltrials.gov on 17.09.18 ( NCT03674931 , no. 81185).

Aims: There is a lack of an objective measurement tool for evaluating the quality of bowing performance in string players. The present study aimed to assess kinematic features of bow strokes performed by violinists and violists affected by bow arm dystonia, compared to healthy controls., Methods: Seven musicians with musician's dystonia and 20 healthy controls participated in the study. A 3D motion capture system was used to record repetitive bowing on a single string at fixed velocities. Temporal variability, an indirect indicator for motor disturbances, was computed in order to evaluate the musicians' performance during the repetitive movements. Simultaneously, muscular activity of essential flexors and extensors of the right arm was recorded using surface electromyography. Antagonistic muscular coactivation and temporal variability were analyzed in a multilevel linear model framework., Results: The results revealed generally higher forearm coactivation during upstrokes as compared to downstrokes in both groups. Whereas coactivation levels of the upper arm did not significantly differ between groups, we found increased forearm coactivation in patients during the more demanding playing conditions. Increased coactivation may represent an adaptive motor control strategy that is applied in order to reduce noise entering the motor system. Furthermore, affected musicians executed bow strokes with higher temporal variability than healthy controls, especially during fast playing., Conclusions: Building on these results we introduce a novel approach using simple kinematic measures to quantifying dystonic symptoms in string players. Even though dystonia patients showed higher temporal variability and elevated forearm coactivation, both variables were not correlated. This finding is discussed with respect to the heterogeneity of musicians' dystonia and its individual-specific manifestations in dystonic symptoms.

Sharp wave ripples (SPW-Rs) are thought to play an important role in memory consolidation. By rapid replay of previously stored information during slow wave sleep and consummatory behavior, they result from the formation of neural ensembles during a learning period. Serotonin (5-HT), suggested to be able to modify SPW-Rs, can affect many neurons simultaneously by volume transmission and alter network functions in an orchestrated fashion. In acute slices from dorsal hippocampus, SPW-Rs can be induced by repeated high frequency stimulation that induces long-lasting LTP. We used this model to study SPW-R appearance and modulation by 5-HT. Although stimulation in presence of 5-HT permitted LTP induction, SPW-Rs were "masked"--but appeared after 5-HT wash-out. This SPW-R masking was dose dependent with 100 nM 5-HT being sufficient--if the 5-HT re-uptake inhibitor citalopram was present. Fenfluramine, a serotonin releaser, could also mask SPW-Rs. Masking was due to 5-HT1A and 5-HT2A/C receptor activation. Neither membrane potential nor membrane conductance changes in pyramidal cells caused SPW-R blockade since both remained unaffected by combining 5-HT and citalopram. Moreover, 10 and 30 μM 5-HT mediated SPW-R masking preceded neuronal hyperpolarization and involved reduced presynaptic transmitter release. 5-HT, as well as a 5-HT1A agonist, augmented paired pulse facilitation and affected the coefficient of variance. Spontaneous SPW-Rs in mice hippocampal slices were also masked by 5-HT and fenfluramine. While neuronal ensembles can acquire long lasting LTP during higher 5-HT levels, lower 5-HT levels enable neural ensembles to replay previously stored information and thereby permit memory consolidation memory., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Visuo-spatial attention can be directed in a top-down controlled way to search for color targets and it can be captured by color contrasts, regardless of color identity. Here we tested whether participants can both search for a particular color target (e.g., red) and make use of a color-contrast cue that predicted the target's most likely position to direct their attention voluntarily. Our results show that this was impossible for the participants. Results support that top-down search for particular colors is incommensurate with directing attention to just any color contrast. The results are discussed in light of the current debates concerning the roles of color and color contrast for visuo-spatial attention.

Salient visual singleton stimuli produce spatial cueing effects indicative of attentional capture only when they match current task sets, suggesting that capture is subject to top-down control. However, such task-set contingent capture effects could be associated with the top-down controlled disengagement of attention from non-matching stimuli that follows their initial bottom-up salience-driven selection. Using the N2pc component as an event-related potential marker of attentional capture, we demonstrate that top-down task set already controls the initial rapid selection of salient visual singleton stimuli prior to any subsequent attentional disengagement. These findings provide new evidence for the primacy of top-down control over bottom-up salience in attentional capture.

We tested under which conditions a colour singleton of which an observer is unaware captures attention. To prevent visual awareness of the colour singleton, we used backward masking. We find that a masked colour singleton cue captures attention if it matches the observer's goal to search for target colours but not if it is task-irrelevant. This is also reflected in event-related potentials to the visible target: the masked goal-matching cue elicits an attentional potential (N2pc) in a target search task. By contrast, a non-matching but equally strong masked colour singleton cue failed to elicit a capture effect and an N2pc. Results are discussed with regard to currently pertaining conceptions of attentional capture by colour singletons., (Copyright 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)