| Musical instruments create sound by vibrating in different ways |
 | Reed Instruments - the reed is vibrated and a player's lips are usedto create changes in air pressure. |
 | Brass Instruments - a player's lips are vibrated as he or she puffs onthe instrument. |
 | String Instuments - strings on the instrument are vibrated by pluckingor bowing. |
 | Percussion Instruments - objects are vibrated by banging themtogether. |
| The ear convertssound waves into movement by vibrating specific parts of the middle andinner ear. This movement is then converted into electrical signals thattravel in the eighth cranial nerve tothe brain. The figure on the right shows the location of the eighthcranial nerve (vestibulocochlear nerve) on the base of the brain. Fromthe ear, auditory information travels first to the brain stem, then to thethalamus, then to the auditory cortex on both sides of the brain (on thetemporallobe). | 
Base of Brain 
Temporal Lobe |
| The Lobes forMusic |
 
| Damage tothe temporal lobe of the brain may cause a person to haveproblems with singing a song, playing an instrument or keeping rhythm. Sometimes this damage causes problems related to recognizing music, butno problem with hearing speech and other sounds. This type of conditionis called amusia. People with amusia have troublerecognizing melodies. Some research has suggested that music isprocessedby the right cerebral hemisphere. Other research has shown that the lefthemisphere is also important. Listening to music and appreciating musicis a complex process that involves memory, learning and emotions. It islikely that there are multiple areas of the brain that are important forthe musical experience. |  
|
| Music andthe EEG There have not been many experiments thathave looked to see how the brain processes music.Measurements ofbrain activity using the electroencephalogram(EEG) have shown that both the right and left hemispheres areresponsive to music. Other researchers have recorded neuronal activityfrom the temporal lobe of patients undergoing brain surgery forepilepsy. During this study, awake patients heard either a song byMozart, afolk song or the theme from "Miami Vice". These different kinds of musichad different effects on the neurons in the temporal lobe. The Mozartsong and folk song reduced the activity in 48% of the neurons while thetheme from Miami Vice reduced the activity in only 26% of the neurons.Also the Miami Vice music increased the activity in 74% of the neuronswhile Mozart and folk music increase the activity in only about 20% of theneurons. Some of the neurons had action potentialsthat kept time with the rhythm of the music. While these results do showthat the temporal lobe is probably involved with some aspect of music, itis unclear exactly how this area of the brain is used in the appreciationof music. | 
The Polygraph -
used to record theEEG
The ActionPotential |
| Music and Memory and Intelligence Several years ago, an experiment was done which seemed to show thatlistening toclassical music could improve memory! Thiseffect has come to be known as "TheMozart Effect" since the musical selection that seemed toimprove memory was a song by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Many people readabout this experiment in popular magazines and newspapers and thought thatlistening to classical music would be a good way to improve memory andincrease intelligence. Let'slook a bit closer at the original experiment and more recentexperiments.The original experiment was publishedin the journal Natureby scientists at the University of California at Irvine in 1993. Thesescientists had college students listen for 10 minutes to either: - Mozart's sonata for two pianos in D major
- a relaxation tape OR
- silence
Immediately after listening to these selections, students took a spatialreasoning test (from the Stanford-Binet intelligence scale). The resultsshowed that the students' scores improved after listening to the Mozarttape compared to either the relaxation tape or silence.Unfortunately, the researchers found that the effects of the musiclasted only 10 to 15 minutes. Nevertheless, these researchers believed that memory was improved because music and spatial abilities sharedthe same pathways in the brain. Therefore, they thought, the music"warms up" (these are my words) the brain for the spatial reasoningtest. Other laboratories have tried touse the music of Mozart to improvememory, but have failed. For example, one group of scientists useda test where students had to listen to a list of numbers, and then repeatthem backwards (this is called a backwards digit span test). Listening toMozart before this test had NO EFFECT on the students. Apparently theMozart Effect depends on what kind of test is used.Other researchers have said that the original work on the Mozart Effectwas flawed since:
- only a few students were tested
- it was possible that listening to Mozart really did not improvememory. Rather, it was possible that the relaxation test and silenceIMPAIRED memory.
 Ina recent attempt to demonstrate the Mozart Effect, researchers atAppalachian State University went to great lengths to follow the exactprocedures of previous studies. In the July 10, 1999 issue ofPsychological Science (vol. 10, pages 366-369), Dr. Kenneth Steeleand coworkers reported that they were unable to show that listening to the music ofMozart had any effect on spatial-reasoning performance. They conclude bystating:
"...there is little evidence to support basing intellectualintervention on the existence of the Mozart effect." The group of researchers who were successful at finding the Mozart Effecthas also looked at the effects of music lessons onspatial reasoning. They gave preschool children (ages 3-4 yr. old)training for 8 months. Children were divided into 4 groups: Experimental Groups|
| Group 1 | Group 2 | Group 3 | Group 4 | Keyboard lessons
 Singing lessons
 | Computer lessons
 | No lessons |
 After 8 months of this treatment, the children were tested on theirability to put puzzles together (spatial-temporal reasoning) and torecognize shapes (spatial-recognition reasoning). The results werefascinating! They found that only those children who received the keyboardlessons had improvement in the spatial-temporaltest. Even when the children were tested one day after their lastkeyboard lesson, they still showed this improvement. So, the effects ofthe keyboard lesson lasted at least one day. Test scores on thespatial-recognition test did NOT improve in any of the groups, even thekeyboard group. Some researchers have eventried to see if the Mozart Effect exists in monkeys! In these studies,monkeys listened to Mozart piano music for 15 minutes before theyhad to do a memory test. The researchers found that listening to Mozartmusic did NOT improve the monkeys' performance compared to when themonkeys listened to rhythms or white noise. They also found thatlistening to Mozart during the test impaired memory and while whitenoise during the test improved memory slightly.Politicians have even jumped on the Mozart Effect bandwagon. On June 22,1998, the governor of the state of Georgia (Zell Miller) starteddistributing free CDs with classical music to the parents of every newbornbaby in his state. I have a feeling that the governor has not read all theliterature on the subject. The only study that has shown the Mozart Effectwas done with college students. There have been no studies thathave looked at the effects of music on the intelligence of babies. Somepeople say that that Governor Miller's plan is good, others think themoney could be better spent on other projects.  So, if people want to improvetheir intelligence should theyrun out and buy some classical music? Should children start piano lessonswhen they are young? You are sure to get some beautiful music, but thereis no conclusive evidence that it will improve your intelligence. Also,there is no evidence that music enhances memory permanently. Moreresearch and testing needs to be done to see if and how music and memoryinteract.
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Mozart
Mozart Biography
Listen to the music of Mozart  |
References: (click on the names ofthe authors to geta summaryof the research paper)
- Carlson,S., Rama, P., Artchakov, D. and Linnankoski, I. Effects ofmusic and white noise on working memory performance in monkeys.Neuroreport, 8:2853-2856, 1997.
- Creutzfeldt,O. and Ojemann, G. Neuronal activity in the humanlateral temporal lobe. III. Activity changes during music. Exp. BrainRes., 77:490-498, 1989.
- Ramos,J. and Corsi-Cabrera, M. Does brain electrical activity reactto music? Intern. J. Neurosci., 47:351-357, 1989.
- Rauscher,F.H., Shaw, G.L. and Ky, K.N. Music and spatial taskperformance. Nature, 365:611, 1993.
- Rauscher,F.H., Shaw, G.L. and Ky, K.N. Listening to Mozart enhancesspatial-temporal reasoning: Towards a neurophysiological basis. Neurosci.Lett., 185:44-47, 1995.
- Rauscher,F.H., Shaw, G.L., Levine, L.J., Wright, E.L., Dennis, W.R.and Newcomb, R.L. Music training causes long-term enhancement ofpreschool children's spatial-temporal reasoning. Neurol. Res., 19:2-8,1997.
- Steele,K.M., Ball, T.N. and Runk, R. Listening to Mozart does notenhance backwards digit span performance. Perceptual and Motor Skills,84:1179-1184, 1997.
- Steele, K.M., Bass, K.E. and Crook, M.D. The mystery of the Mozarteffect: failure to replicate. Psychological Science, 10:366-369, 1999.
At its mostbasic level, music is just sound. Sound produced by vibration. Thesevibrations can be caused by voices, musical instruments or by objectshitting each other. Sounds are carried to the ear by changes in airpressure. Music itself has several important characteristics like rhythm,pitch, timbre and melody.
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