Music classes in childhood may lead to changes in the brain_美文

Music classes in childhood may lead to changes in the brain

“Nerves in your brain that respond to sound give off electricity, and we can capture that electricity, and we can determine how does your nervous system respond to speech, to music, to elements of sound that we think are important for communication.”

One of the simplest sounds played for the volunteers was “da”. Listen carefully because the sound is very short and quick.

Here is the sound again.

After the human brain processed the sound, it sounded like this.

That sound came through the computer and was played on a speaker. Again…

The volunteers also heard other sounds, like this music from the British rock group Deep Purple. Here is a very small part of the song “Smoke on the Water.” Listen carefully.

Now, here is what it sounded like on a speaker after going through the brain of a volunteer.

The second sound is not as clear as the first, but it provided the information needed to be studied on a computer screen. Ms. Kraus says she could see an important difference in the way the processed sounds looked.

“These young adults who received formal music instruction as children had more robust neural responses to sound than peers who had never participated in music lessons.”

She says she could look at the computer screen and easily see who was a musician, and who was not. The computer screen’s graph, or picture of the sound, was larger for the volunteers who played music.