The brain and musical training
The participants were all young children and right-hand dominant. They were put into 2 groups, an instrumental group and a control. A scan at the start of the test showed no structural differences between the children in either group, therefore no children showed any direct advantages in musicality. This provides evidence to suggest that the changes that the brain had undergone over the 15 month period were induced mainly by the musical training rather than other pre-existing factors. 11 The findings support the idea that musical training in early childhood encourages more neuroplasticity. Although, it should be noted that pre-existing biological predictors and genetics will still af fect children’s brain development in music but not to such an extent which would invalidate the findings of previous investigations.
Figure 5: the graph shows the scores of the low practiser group (LP) against the high practiser group (HP) . They took 518 tests for literacy and these are their results. The score of 50 is the average score of the age under normal circumstances.
The results of another study by A. Seither- Preisler et al. in 2014, which sought to find evidence that ‘ Size and Synchronization of Auditory Cortex Promotes Musical, Literacy, and Attentional Skills in Children ’ , shows the behavioural differences caused by some of the changes that take place. In this study, there were 4 groups, of which two are of particular interest: the high practisers (HP) and low practisers (LP). Over a 13-month period, they were scanned twice to see the difference in
their auditory cortex and how it correlated with their performance on a series of tests. The results of the preliminary scans showed major differences in the size ratio of each group's Heschl’s gyrus (HG) and their planum temporale (PT) (Fig. 6). The HP group, who had the largest HG in terms of GM volume, consistently outperformed the LP group. These results show that increased size of the auditory cortex improves literacy and attentional skills in children which also suggests that children in musical training very likely will outperform their peers who are not involved in music. 12
affects cognitive development: rhythm, reward and other modulating variables https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3957486/ ( 11/07/20 ).
11 Hyde, K., Lerch, J., Norton, A., Forgeard, M., Winner, E., Evans, A. and Schlaug, G. Musical Training Shapes Structural Brain Development 16. https://www.jneurosci.org/content/29/10/3019 ( 12/07/20 ).In the reading and literacy tests only the HP and LP groups were tested as msot AD(H)D children showed slight impairments to these areas. 12 Seither-Preisler, A., Parncutt, R. and Schneider, P. Size and Synchronization of Auditory Cortex Promotes Musical, Literacy, and Attentional Skills in Children 18https://www.jneurosci.org/content/34/33/10937 ( 11/07/20 ).
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