Summary: New research suggests that long-term musical training can help older adults preserve more youthful brain connectivity and improve their ability to understand speech in noisy environments. Compared with non-musicians of the same age, older musicians showed more efficient functional brain networks and better performance on speech-in-noise tasks, consistent with the idea that musical experience builds cognitive reserve.
The findings indicate that positive lifestyle choices—such as learning and maintaining musical skills—may help protect neural networks from age-related change, reducing the need for the compensatory overactivity often seen in aging brains. This study highlights how sustained musical practice may contribute to preserved auditory perception and communication in later life.
Key facts
- Older musicians outperformed age-matched non-musicians on speech-in-noise tasks and showed brain connectivity patterns more similar to young adults.
- Functional MRI revealed that musical training is associated with preserved integrity of auditory and motor networks involved in speech processing.
- Results support the “Hold-Back Upregulation” hypothesis: cognitive reserve from experience can maintain brain efficiency and limit age-related compensatory increases in neural activity.
Source: PLOS
Long-term musical training may mitigate age-related declines in speech perception by strengthening cognitive reserve, according to a study published July 15 in PLOS Biology by Claude Alain (Baycrest Academy for Research and Education, Canada) and Yi Du (Chinese Academy of Sciences).
Normal aging is commonly accompanied by declines in both sensory and cognitive function. Many older adults recruit additional neural resources and show increased functional connectivity across widespread brain networks when performing demanding tasks. This upregulation is often interpreted as a compensatory strategy to preserve performance, but it can also reflect reduced efficiency.
Researchers note that lifestyle factors such as musical training, higher education, and bilingualism contribute to cognitive and brain reserve: accumulated neural and cognitive resources that help people cope with age-related brain change. Cognitive Reserve Theory proposes that these reserves can reduce the functional impact of neural decline and support better-than-expected performance with age.
To test how long-term musical training relates to age-related neural upregulation, the team used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure brain activity in three groups: 25 older musicians, 25 older non-musicians, and 24 younger non-musicians. Participants identified syllables presented with background noise while researchers examined task-related responses and connectivity patterns.
The analysis targeted the auditory dorsal stream, a network that includes auditory cortex, inferior parietal regions, dorsal frontal motor areas, and frontal motor regions. This network supports mapping sounds to actions and sensorimotor integration during speech processing—functions that are especially important in noisy listening conditions.
Results showed that older non-musicians displayed the typical age-related increase in functional connectivity in auditory dorsal streams bilaterally, interpreted as compensatory upregulation. In contrast, older musicians exhibited bilateral connectivity patterns that closely resembled those of younger non-musicians. In older musicians, connectivity strength in the right dorsal stream was associated with better speech-in-noise performance.
Moreover, older musicians maintained a more youthful spatial pattern of task-related functional connectivity, while older non-musicians consistently diverged from the young pattern. Together, these findings support the “Hold-Back Upregulation” hypothesis: cognitive reserve from musical training appears to preserve efficient network organization, reducing the need for compensatory increases in activity and enabling superior behavioral outcomes.
The study does not establish causation; its cross-sectional design means it cannot definitively prove that musical training causes preserved connectivity. The authors recommend longitudinal and intervention studies that test the hypothesis across other cognitive domains—such as memory and attention—and investigate additional sources of reserve like physical exercise and bilingualism.
These results have practical implications: promoting enriching activities such as musical practice could be an accessible strategy to help older adults maintain auditory communication and cognitive health. As Dr. Lei Zhang notes, “A positive lifestyle helps older adults cope better with cognitive ageing, and it is never too late to take up, and stick with, a rewarding hobby such as learning an instrument.”
Dr. Yi Du adds, “Just like a well-tuned instrument doesn’t need to be played louder to be heard, the brains of older musicians stay finely tuned thanks to years of training. Our study shows that this musical experience builds cognitive reserve, helping their brains avoid the usual age-related overexertion when trying to understand speech in noisy places.”
Funding: This research was supported by the STI 2030 Major Project to YD, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to CA, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to CA. Funders did not influence study design, data collection and analysis, the decision to publish, or manuscript preparation.
About this cognition, aging, and music research news
Author: Claire Turner
Source: PLOS
Contact: Claire Turner – PLOS
Image: Image credited to Neuroscience News
Original research (open access): “Long-term musical training can protect against age-related upregulation of neural activity in speech-in-noise perception” by Lei Zhang et al., PLOS Biology. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3003247
Abstract
Long-term musical training can protect against age-related upregulation of neural activity in speech-in-noise perception
Older adults often show increased frontoparietal neural activity and stronger functional connectivity when performing cognitive tasks. Cognitive reserve accumulated from life experiences—like long-term musical training—may supply additional neural resources to offset age-related changes.
This study measured fMRI activity during a speech-in-noise task to determine whether musical training strengthens cognitive reserve by bolstering network efficiency or by preventing the age-related upregulation of neural activity. Older musicians showed less task-induced upregulation of functional connectivity in auditory dorsal regions than older non-musicians, and this reduced upregulation predicted their superior behavioral performance.
Older musicians also displayed more youth-like spatial patterns of functional connectivity. These findings indicate that cognitive reserve from long-term musical practice can hold back age-related neural recruitment during challenging listening, clarifying how life-long experience influences the brain’s response to aging.