Department of Psychiatry, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
Hum Brain Mapp. 2009 Nov;30(11):3736-47. doi: 10.1002/hbm.20802.
Pre-attentive registration of aberrations in predictable sound patterns is attributed to the temporal cortex. However, electrophysiology suggests that frontal areas become more important when deviance complexity increases. To play an instrument in an ensemble, professional musicians have to rely on the ability to detect even slight deviances from expected musical patterns and therefore have highly trained aural skills. Here, we aimed to identify the neural correlates of experience-driven plasticity related to the processing of complex sound features. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging in combination with an event-related oddball paradigm and compared brain activity in professional musicians and non-musicians during pre-attentive processing of melodic contour variations. The melodic pattern consisted of a sequence of five tones each lasting 50 ms interrupted by silent interstimulus intervals of 50 ms. Compared to non-musicians, the professional musicians showed enhanced activity in the left middle and superior temporal gyri, the left inferior frontal gyrus and in the right ventromedial prefrontal cortex in response to pattern deviation. This differential brain activity pattern was correlated with behaviorally tested musical aptitude. Our results thus support an experience-related role of the left temporal cortex in fast melodic contour processing and suggest involvement of the prefrontal cortex.
对可预测声音模式中的偏差进行前注意注册归因于颞叶皮层。然而，电生理学表明，当偏差复杂性增加时，额叶区域变得更加重要。为了在合奏中演奏乐器，专业音乐家必须依靠检测预期音乐模式中微小偏差的能力，因此他们具有高度训练有素的听觉技能。在这里，我们旨在确定与处理复杂声音特征相关的经验驱动可塑性的神经相关性。我们使用功能磁共振成像结合事件相关的Oddball 范式，比较了专业音乐家和非音乐家在旋律轮廓变化的前注意处理过程中的大脑活动。旋律模式由每个持续 50 毫秒的五个音符组成，由 50 毫秒的无声刺激间隔打断。与非音乐家相比，专业音乐家在对模式偏差做出反应时，左中颞叶、左下回额回和右腹内侧前额叶皮层的活动增强。这种不同的大脑活动模式与经过行为测试的音乐能力相关。因此，我们的研究结果支持了左颞叶在快速旋律轮廓处理中与经验相关的作用，并表明前额叶皮层的参与。
