Brattico E, Brusa A, Dietz M, Jacobsen T, Fernandes H M, Gaggero G, Toiviainen P, Vuust P, Proverbio A M
Center for Music in the Brain (MIB), Institute of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University & Royal Academy of Music Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark; Department of Education, Psychology, Communication, University of Bari Aldo Moro, Italy.
University of Milano-Bicocca, Milano, Italy.
Neuroscience. 2025 Feb 16;567:308-325. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroscience.2024.12.008. Epub 2024 Dec 9.
Beauty judgments are common in daily life, but rarely studied in cognitive neuroscience. Here, in three studies, we searched for the neural mechanisms of musical beauty using a naturalistic free-listening paradigm applied to behavioral and neuroimaging recordings and validated by experts' judgments. In Study 1, 30 adults continuously rated the perceived beauty of three musical pieces using a motion sensor. This served to identify the musical passages that were inter-subjectively judged as more or less beautiful ('beautiful' vs. 'not-beautiful' passages). For identifying the consistent neural determinants of the perception of musical beauty, we utilized these ratings in Study 2, where 36 adults were recorded with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while they listened attentively to the same pieces of Study 1. In Study 3, to identify the musicological features characterizing the beautiful and not-beautiful passages of Studies 1-2, we collected post-hoc questionnaires from 12 music-composition experts. Results from Study 2 evidenced focal activity in the orbitofrontal cortex when listening to beautiful passages whereas the not-beautiful passages were associated with bilateral supratemporal activity. Effective connectivity analysis discovered inhibition of auditory activation and neural communication with the right orbitofrontal cortex for listening to beautiful passages vs. intrinsic activation of auditory cortices and decreased coupling to orbitofrontal cortex for not-beautiful passages. Experts' questionnaires indicated that the beautiful passages were more melodic, calm, sad, slow, tonal, traditional, and simple than the ones rated negatively. In sum, we identified neural and psychological underpinnings of musical beauty, irrespectively of individual taste and listening biography.
美感判断在日常生活中很常见，但在认知神经科学领域却很少被研究。在此，我们通过三项研究，运用自然主义的自由聆听范式，对行为和神经成像记录进行研究，并经专家判断验证，来探寻音乐美感的神经机制。在研究1中，30名成年人使用运动传感器持续对三首音乐作品的感知美感进行评分。这有助于确定在主体间被判定为或多或少具有美感的音乐段落（“优美”与“不优美”的段落）。为了确定音乐美感感知的一致神经决定因素，我们在研究2中利用了这些评分，36名成年人在专心聆听与研究1相同的音乐作品时，接受了功能磁共振成像（fMRI）记录。在研究3中，为了确定表征研究1 - 2中优美和不优美段落的音乐学特征，我们收集了12位音乐作曲专家的事后问卷。研究2的结果表明，聆听优美段落时眶额皮质有局灶性活动，而不优美段落则与双侧颞上回活动相关。有效连接分析发现，聆听优美段落时听觉激活受到抑制且与右侧眶额皮质的神经交流减少，而聆听不优美段落时听觉皮质有内在激活且与眶额皮质的耦合减少。专家问卷表明，优美段落比评分较低的段落更具旋律性、更舒缓、更悲伤、节奏更慢、调性更强、更传统且更简单。总之，我们确定了音乐美感的神经和心理基础，而与个人品味和聆听经历无关。
