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<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTqbrOlOEXTFrAr6DA8xb1UMj3AyrhrVe733Iv2wfK1nn4x3sy77MuoKmeboVlUytmPU1OmD-p4rzGZqkZXLmBAtAPihlxChN8gAvOax4XcyeBxjCzIRzsJZtfVd3urKNx17v3-f1zsd3P/s1600/130415120025-brain-music-story-top.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTqbrOlOEXTFrAr6DA8xb1UMj3AyrhrVe733Iv2wfK1nn4x3sy77MuoKmeboVlUytmPU1OmD-p4rzGZqkZXLmBAtAPihlxChN8gAvOax4XcyeBxjCzIRzsJZtfVd3urKNx17v3-f1zsd3P/s640/130415120025-brain-music-story-top.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Whether you are rocking out to Macklemore <br />& Ryan Lewis in your car or reading with Bach in your bedroom, music<br /> has a special ability to pump us up or calm us down.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph2" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Scientists are still <br />trying to figure out what's going on in our brains when we listen to <br />music and how it produces such potent effects on the psyche.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph3" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"We're using music to <br />better understand brain function in general," said Daniel Levitin, a <br />prominent psychologist who studies the neuroscience of music at McGill <br />University in Montreal.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph4" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Three studies published <br />this month explore how the brain responds to music. The quest to dissect<br /> exactly what chemical processes occur when we put our headphones on is <br />far from over, but scientists have come across some clues.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph5" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph5" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>Health benefits of music</b></div><br /><div class="cnn_strylftcntnt" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div class="cnn_strylctcntr cnn_strylccimg300"><br /><div class="cnn_strylccimg300cntr" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /><img alt="" border="0" class="box-image" height="169" src="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/130327165059-brain-title-story-body.jpg" width="300" /><br /></div><br /></div><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph6" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Listening to music feels good, but can that translate into physiological benefit? Levitin and colleagues published a <a href="http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/abstract/S1364-6613%2813%2900049-1" target="_blank">meta-analysis</a><b> </b>of 400 studies in the journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences, suggesting the answer is yes.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph7" style="text-align: justify;"><br />In one study reviewed, <br />researchers studied patients who were about to undergo surgery. <br />Participants were randomly assigned to either listen to music or take <br />anti-anxiety drugs. Scientists tracked patient's ratings of their own <br />anxiety, as well as the levels of the stress hormone cortisol.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph8" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The results: The patients<br /> who listened to music had less anxiety and lower cortisol than people <br />who took drugs. Levitin cautioned that this is only one study, and more <br />research needs to be done to confirm the results, but it points toward a<br /> powerful medicinal use for music.</div><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: center;"><tbody><br /><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" class="box-image" height="120" src="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120525104849-orig-ideas-charles-limb-00014830-story-body.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="214" /></td></tr><br /><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><cite class="expCaption">Making music sound 'better'</cite></td></tr><br /></tbody></table><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph9" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"The promise here is that<br /> music is arguably less expensive than drugs, and it's easier on the <br />body and it doesn't have side effects," Levitin said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph10" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Levitin and colleagues <br />also highlighted evidence that music is associated with immunoglobin A, <br />an antibody linked to immunity, as well as higher counts of cells that <br />fight germs and bacteria.</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" name="em2"></a></div><br /><div class="cnn_strylftcntnt cnn_strylftcexpbx" id="expand111" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph11" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/26/health/mental-health/music-brain-science">More: How music changes the brain</a></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph12" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph12" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph12" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>What music we like</b></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph13" style="text-align: justify;"><br />So music is good for us, but how do we judge what music is pleasurable? A <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/340/6129/216.abstract" target="_blank">study </a>published<br /> in the journal Science suggests that patterns of brain activity can <br />indicate whether a person likes what he or she is hearing.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph14" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Valorie Salimpoor, a <br />researcher at the Rotman Research Institute in Toronto and former <br />Levitin student, led a study in which participants listened to 60 <br />excerpts of music they had never heard before while in a functional <br />magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph15" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The 19 participants were<br /> asked to indicate how much money they would spend on a given song when <br />listening to the excerpts, while also allowing researchers to analyze <br />patterns of brain activity through the fMRI.<b> </b>Such a <br />small number of participants is common in an fMRI study for reasons of <br />complexity and cost, although it suggests more research should be done.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph16" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The study authors <br />highlight in their results a brain area called the nucleus accumbens, <br />which is involved in forming expectations.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph17" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"There is actually a <br />network of activity that predicts whether or not you're going to buy <br />this music as you're listening to the music," Salimpoor said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph18" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The more activity in the<br /> nucleus accumbens, the more money people said they were willing to <br />spend on any particular song in the "auction" set-up that the <br />researchers designed.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph19" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"This was an indicator that some sort of reward-related expectations were met or surpassed," she said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph20" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Another brain area <br />called the superior temporal gyrus is intimately involved in the <br />experience of music, and its connection to the nucleus accumbens is <br />important, she said. The genres of music that a person listens to over a<br /> lifetime impact how the superior temporal gyrus is formed.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph21" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The superior temporal <br />gyrus alone doesn't predict whether a person likes a given piece of <br />music, but it's involved in storing templates from what you've heard <br />before. For instance, a person who has heard a lot of jazz before is <br />more likely to appreciate a given piece of jazz music than someone with a<br /> lot less experience.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph22" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"The brain kind of works like a music recommendation system," Salimpoor said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph23" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><a href="http://www.zlab.mcgill.ca/science2013/" target="_blank">You can listen to the clips that the researchers used in the study here.</a></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph24" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Levitin called the <br />findings "interesting," but views it as a refinement of what other <br />laboratories have found in the past. He and Vinod Menon at Stanford <br />University were the first to show the role of the nucleus accumbens in <br />music in 2005.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph25" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/02/health/mental-health/beauty-brain-research" target="_blank">Beholding beauty: How it's been studied</a></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph26" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph26" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>Are we all</b><b> </b><b>hearing the same thing? </b></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph27" style="text-align: justify;"><br />It seems intuitive that <br />different people, based on their personalities, preferences and personal<br /> histories of listening to particular music, will have different <br />experiences when exposed to a particular piece of music. Their attention<br /> to various details will vary and they might like different things about<br /> it.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph28" style="text-align: justify;"><br />But Levitin and his collaborators showed in a European Journal of Neuroscience <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ejn.12173/abstract" target="_blank">study </a>that, from the perspective of the brain, there may be more similarities among music listeners than you think.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph29" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"Despite our <br />idiosyncrasies in listening, the brain experiences music in a very <br />consistent fashion across subjects," said Daniel Abrams, lead author and<br /> postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University School of Medicine.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph30" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Seventeen participants <br />who had little or no music training took part in this study which, like <br />Salimpoor's, is small, but typical for an fMRI study. Participants <br />listened to four symphonies by composer William Boyce of the late <br />Baroque period, which the researchers chose because they reflect Western<br /> music but were likely to be unfamiliar to subjects.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph31" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Among participants, the researchers found synchronization in<b> </b>several<br /> key brain areas, and similar brain activity patterns in different <br />people who listen to the same music. This suggests that the participants<br /> not only perceive the music the same way, but, despite whatever <br />personal differences they brought to the table, there's a level on which<br /> they share a common experience.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph32" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Brain regions involved <br />in movement, attention, planning and memory consistently showed <br />activation when participants listened to music -- these are structures <br />that don't have to do with auditory processing itself. This means that <br />when we experience of music, a lot of other things are going on beyond <br />merely processing sound, Abrams said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph33" style="text-align: justify;"><br />One resulting theory is <br />that these brain areas are involved in holding particular parts of a <br />song, such as the melody, in the mind while the rest of the piece of <br />music plays on, Abrams said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph34" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The results also reflect the power of music to unite people, Levitin said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph35" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"It's not our natural <br />tendency to thrust ourselves into a crowd of 20,000 people, but for a <br />Muse concert or a Radiohead concert we'll do it," Levitin said. "There's<br /> this unifying force that comes from the music, and we don't get that <br />from other things."</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph36" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Further research might <br />compare how individuals with healthy brains differ in their musical <br />listening compared to people with autism or other brain disorders, <br />Abrams said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph37" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"The methods that we've used can be applied to understand how the brain tracks auditory information over time," Abrams said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph38" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/15/health/art-brain-mind">What the brain draws from: Art and neuroscience</a></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph39" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><br /></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph39" style="text-align: justify;"><br /><b>What's next</b></div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph40" style="text-align: justify;"><br />The next frontier in the<br /> neuroscience of music is to look more carefully at which chemicals in <br />the brain are involved in music listening and performing, Levitin said, <br />and in which parts of the brain are they active.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph41" style="text-align: justify;"><br />Any given neurochemical <br />can have different function depending on its area of the brain, he said.<br /> For instance, dopamine helps increase attention in the frontal lobes, <br />but in the limbic system it is associated with pleasure.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph42" style="text-align: justify;"><br />By using music as a <br />window into the function of a healthy brain, researchers may gain <br />insights into a slew of neurological and psychiatric problems, he said.</div><br /><div class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph43" style="text-align: justify;"><br />"Knowing better how the <br />brain is organized, how it functions, what chemical messengers are <br />working and how they're working -- that will allow us to formulate <br />treatments for people with brain injury, or to combat diseases or <br />disorders or even psychiatric problems," Levitin said. </div><br /><div class="cnnByline" style="text-align: justify;"><br />By <b>Elizabeth Landau</b>, CNN</div><br /></div><br />

This is your brain on music

Whether you are rocking out to Macklemore & Ryan Lewis in your car or reading with Bach in your bedroom, music has a special ability to...

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFRkl3LrM1Oo4xCfyj2ORQEy4Y7EAsmdxl9niDvkm4GitTRoxqXB6BnAfLIbZ_Gw8m-thwgdbVYJ_hDk-Wn7bvtesXu1bQ8Q-FP7AXCK6EHe37ustWU_BVVI_ZIU3jP8COjptZq8jEH4ii/s1600/brainmusic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFRkl3LrM1Oo4xCfyj2ORQEy4Y7EAsmdxl9niDvkm4GitTRoxqXB6BnAfLIbZ_Gw8m-thwgdbVYJ_hDk-Wn7bvtesXu1bQ8Q-FP7AXCK6EHe37ustWU_BVVI_ZIU3jP8COjptZq8jEH4ii/s640/brainmusic.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />A music-based training program that challenges both the body and the mind may improve <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain">brain function</a> and mood among seniors, suggests a new study from <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.8333333333,8.33333333333&spn=10.0,10.0&q=46.8333333333,8.33333333333%20(Switzerland)&t=h">Switzerland</a>.<br /><br /><br /><br />"The take-home message is that 6-months of music-based <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_multitasking">multitask</a> training (i.e., Jaques-<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalcroze_Eurhythmics">Dalcroze eurhythmics</a>) - a specific training regimen which was previously shown to be effective in improving gait and reducing falls - has beneficial effects on cognition and mood in older adults," Dr. Mélany Hars, of <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=46.19889,6.14449&spn=0.01,0.01&q=46.19889,6.14449%20(University%20of%20Geneva)&t=h">Geneva University</a> Hospitals, told <a href="http://www.reuters.com/">Reuters Health</a> in an email.<br /><br /><br /><br />Jacques-Dalcroze eurhythmics was developed in the early part of the 20th century by the Swiss composer <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89mile_Jaques-Dalcroze">Emile Jaques-Dalcroze</a> as a way to better understand music through movement. It is practiced worldwide, particularly in the fields of music, theater, dance and therapy, according to Hars.<br /><br /><br /><br />A typical Jacques-Dalcroze session involves participants adapting their movements to the rhythmic changes of improvised <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano">piano music</a>. In Hars' study, the participants were challenged to perform specific multitasking skills, such as walking to the rhythm of a piano while handling a percussion instrument and responding to changes in the piano's rhythm.<br /><br /><br /><br />The study participants were also asked to perform quick reaction exercises, such as starting or stopping to walk or changing their walking speed on command, as well as matching their steps to the long or short music notes that were played.<br /><br /><br /><br />The study included 134 men and women aged 75 years, on average, who were all at increased risk for falls but who did not live in a nursing home or other facility. These seniors were randomly divided into a study group that attended hour-long music-based multitasking sessions once a week for 25 weeks or a comparison group that just kept up their normal lifestyles and did not attend training sessions.<br /><br /><br /><br />At the beginning of the study, both groups underwent a battery of tests for mental function and mood.<br /><br /><br /><br />After six months, the 66 adults who participated in the music training sessions showed improved <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognition">cognitive function</a>, particularly on a test of their degree of sensitivity to interference, and decreased anxiety, compared to the group that had not done the training.<br /><br /><br /><br />"This may have implications for everyday life function," since many situations require individuals to pay selective attention to one thing while blocking out something else, such as distracting surroundings, Hars and her coauthors write in the journal Age and Ageing.<br /><br /><br /><br />How the training might be responsible for the improvements is unknown, Hars acknowledges.<br /><br /><br /><br />However, she noted, "some studies suggest that music can mitigate effects of the aging brain… (and) some studies have revealed that specific <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_exercise">physical exercise</a> regimens may enhance (not only) cognitive performance but also brain function or brain structure of older adults."<br /><br /><br /><br />Jacques-Dalcroze eurhythmics puts it all together in a program that combines gait, balance, movement coordination and flexibility training while also engaging attention and memory skills, Hars said.<br /><br /><br /><br />This "is likely to engage multiple brain regions through a combination of music, rhythm, and exercise," Hars said.<br /><br /><br /><br />Whether the training is also linked with fewer falls or improved walking ability in these seniors remains to be studied, the researchers point out in their report.</div><br /><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /><div id="manPortal"><br /></div><br /><div class="copy" id="article_center_wrapper"><br /><div class="article_clearing"><br />mson/Reuters. All rights reserved.<br /><br /><br /><br /></div><br /></div><br /></div><br /></div><br />

Music Can Boost Seniors' Brain Function: Study

A music-based training program that challenges both the body and the mind may improve brain function and mood among seniors, suggests a new...