Music training initiated during high school might hone brain development.
Beginning music lessons as late as high school can sharpen teenagers’ auditory processing and strengthen language-related skills, according to a Northwestern University study. The research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), shows that group music classes offered in school can accelerate aspects of adolescent brain development tied to hearing and language.
The study tracked students over three years and found that instrumental music instruction led to measurable changes in both subcortical and cortical responses to sound, along with greater improvements in phonological awareness than those seen in an active control group. These outcomes suggest that music education contributes not only to musical ability but also to broader cognitive skills important for academic success.
“Although music classes are often trimmed from school budgets, our results underscore the value of music in the high school curriculum,” said Nina Kraus, the study’s senior author and director of Northwestern’s Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory. “Music training appears to promote what educators call ‘learning to learn’—a capacity that supports many areas of classroom achievement.”
The researchers recruited 40 freshmen from Chicago-area high schools in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods and followed them from the start of high school through their senior year. Approximately half the students enrolled in school band, receiving two to three hours per week of in-school, group instrumental instruction. The comparison group participated in junior ROTC classes that emphasized physical fitness and met for a similar amount of time. Both groups attended the same schools and shared comparable socioeconomic backgrounds.
Electrophysiological recordings taken before training and three years later revealed notable differences between the groups. Students in the band program showed accelerated maturation of cortical auditory responses and more stable subcortical processing of fine acoustic details. In other words, their brains became quicker and more consistent at encoding sound, a neural advantage that supports effective speech and language processing.
Behavioral testing confirmed the neural findings. Both the music and ROTC groups improved on measures of phonological processing and sound-structure awareness over the three years, but students who received music instruction showed larger gains. The study highlights that targeted musical experience during adolescence can produce specific benefits for auditory and language systems.
The authors note that stable, detailed subcortical processing of sound is critical for language development and is often weakened in children raised in poverty. Because the participating schools served low-income communities, the results raise the possibility that music programs in school may help offset socioeconomic disparities in auditory and language development.
“These findings demonstrate that the adolescent brain remains highly responsive to training,” the researchers wrote. “In-school music programs can promote experience-driven neural plasticity during the teen years and support skills that extend beyond music itself.”
Key points:
- Music training in high school enhances the teenage brain’s responses to sound and strengthens language-related abilities.
- Group band instruction produced larger neural effects than an active control program focused on fitness (ROTC).
- The study supports the importance of maintaining music programs in high school curricula, especially in low-income communities.
- Nina Kraus and colleagues suggest music fosters general learning capacities often described as “learning to learn.”
Study coauthors include Adam Tierney and Jennifer Krizman from the Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory and the Department of Communication Sciences at Northwestern University.
Source: Julie Deardorff — Northwestern University
Image Credit: NeuroscienceNews.com
Original Research: Abstract for “Music training alters the course of adolescent auditory development” by Adam T. Tierney, Jennifer Krizman, and Nina Kraus in PNAS. Published July 20, 2015. doi:10.1073/pnas.1505114112
Abstract
Music training alters the course of adolescent auditory development
Adolescence involves substantial changes in brain structure and function, but the degree to which experience shapes this developmental window remains unclear. Musical training provides a powerful test case because early-life music training is known to influence auditory skills. This study compared in-school music training to another in-school program that did not emphasize auditory development (an active control). Adolescents were assessed on neural responses to sound and on language skills before entering high school and again three years later. The results show that music training begun in high school prolongs stable subcortical sound processing and accelerates maturation of cortical auditory responses. Both groups improved in phonological processing, but enhancements were greater in the music-trained adolescents. Thus, music training initiated during adolescence can improve neural sound processing and confer advantages for language. These findings demonstrate experience-driven plasticity in the adolescent brain and indicate that in-school programs can produce measurable neural and behavioral benefits.
“Music training alters the course of adolescent auditory development” by Adam T. Tierney, Jennifer Krizman, and Nina Kraus in PNAS. doi:10.1073/pnas.1505114112