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in our pianists were larger than those seen in control children, but that P2 responses to violin and pure tones did not differ between musical and nonmusical children," says Roberts. "On the other hand, the P2 response of our one violinist to the violin tone was two times larger than responses evoked by the violin tone in any other subject in the experiment."

Interestingly, the responses in the Suzuki group of children were the same on the first and second measurements, which meant that one year of formal music training had no effect. At both measurements, however, the Suzuki children showed responses that were equal to children about two years older than them.

The next step in this research is to determine whether enhanced P2 responses are observed when children are trained on novel auditory tasks with which they have had no prior listening experience. Experiments of this type can separate the effects of acoustic experience on auditory brain development from those of intrinsic genetic or prenatal factors. By using appropriate auditory stimuli, it's also possible to evaluate whether acoustic experience modifies neural activity in the primary auditory cortex as well as in the secondary auditory cortex.

Last year, scientists from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, launched a first-of-its-kind study that will be following children for at least three years as they begin and advance through musical studies. "We seek to understand what happens in the brain both structurally and functionally as the children grow and develop and achieve varying levels of musical expertise," says Gottfried Schlaug, MD, PhD, the principal investigator of this research.

This study may help determine whether early music training has any effect on the brains of children and their cognitive development. Previous research in adults has shown that the brains of musicians are structurally different from those of n
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Contact: Dawn McCoy
dawn@sfn.org
202-462-6688
Society for Neuroscience
10-Nov-2003

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