Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208, USA.
J Neurosci. 2012 Aug 22;32(34):11507-10. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1949-12.2012.
Playing a musical instrument changes the anatomy and function of the brain. But do these changes persist after music training stops? We probed this question by measuring auditory brainstem responses in a cohort of healthy young human adults with varying amounts of past musical training. We show that adults who received formal music instruction as children have more robust brainstem responses to sound than peers who never participated in music lessons and that the magnitude of the response correlates with how recently training ceased. Our results suggest that neural changes accompanying musical training during childhood are retained in adulthood. These findings advance our understanding of long-term neuroplasticity and have general implications for the development of effective auditory training programs.
演奏乐器会改变大脑的解剖结构和功能。但是，音乐训练停止后这些变化会持续吗？我们通过测量具有不同音乐训练量的健康年轻成年人的听觉脑干反应来探究这个问题。我们发现，接受过儿童时期正规音乐教育的成年人对声音的脑干反应比从未参加过音乐课的同龄人更强烈，并且反应的幅度与最近停止训练的时间相关。我们的结果表明，儿童时期伴随音乐训练的神经变化在成年后仍能保留。这些发现增进了我们对长期神经可塑性的理解，并对有效听觉训练计划的发展具有普遍意义。
