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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 24, 2019 12:02:07 GMT 10
There are lots of articles on why music is a pleasurable experience.
Music is a complex perceptual experience created in the brain and influenced by an interplay of multiple factors including neurocognitive, emotional, the sum of past experiences (memory), training, mindset of the beholder, endocrine (hormonal) influences, and even spiritual, mystical and aesthetic considerations.
I would like to explore some of these things, both the technical as well as your experiences. Music has been described as 'what feelings sound like'.
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 24, 2019 12:09:54 GMT 10
Music appears to be innate among humans.
Kay Shelemay, professor of music at Harvard said: “All humans come into the world with an innate capability for music. At a very early age, this capability is shaped by the music system of the culture in which a child is raised. That culture affects the construction of instruments, the way people sound when they sing, and even the way they hear sound."
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 24, 2019 12:14:57 GMT 10
From a neurocognitive perspective music stimulates many areas of the brain and is not just the registration at the somatosensory cortex but an integration between many centres and produces a variety of physiological responses.
Emotional centres activated, motor responses are triggered, memory responses are triggered, neuro-endocrine responses triggered, and various evaluative/interpretive processes kick in to assign meaning. There are different areas of the brain that handle speech-language and music, but with some connectedness. Some people with brain injury retain the ability to sing but not talk or understand speech. The non-dominant side of the brain, typically the right side, is generally involved with perceptual processes including aspects of music perception, visuospatial relationships, and things like neurological inattention and neglect.
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 24, 2019 12:18:40 GMT 10
Music is known to release various ‘feel good hormones’ which might explain some of the pleasurable impact. These range from endorphins, endocannabinoids, dopamine, oxytocin, nitric oxide, serotonin. Oxytocin is often called "the love hormone. Hugging and kissing release Oxycontin. It is a powerful hormone that acts as a neurotransmitter in the brain involved in social interactions and maternal-infant bonding and milk release, sexual reproduction and orgasm, and emotions from feelings of empathy, generosity, and trust. It is also has an anti-depressant effect. While it facilitates bonding for those close to us it is said it can have the reverse effect for those that are not in our ‘group’, a kind of tribal thing I guess. Dopamine is one of the ‘reward’ hormones released by pleasant music. Dopamine is also released in other reward and pleasure activities such as food and sex, even better if you eat during sex (not). It is also implicated in motivation and memory. It has a role in regulating motor behaviour and is used to treat people with Parkinson's disease. Interestingly, neuroleptic drugs (anti-psychotics) generally act on the dopaminergic system. Serotonin is one of the antidepressant hormones and target for one of the major forms of pharmacological antidepressant medications SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors). In Australia these are marketed as brand names like Prozac (old) Lexapro, Zoloft. There is also serotonin noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors (SNRI) marketed in Australia as such things as Cymbalta, Effexor or Prestiq. This latter group also has a place in management of pain. Serotonin has also been implicated in many other functions including sleep and appetite regulation Nitric oxide in the body is a vasodilator and also an important signalling molecule/neurotransmitter in the body. It has been implicated in control of blood pressure and diseases like atherosclerosis. It is also implicated in the brain affecting behaviour in cognitive function and even to some degree neuroplasticity. Interestingly it is also involved in penile erection. Things like Viagra and Cialis can manipulate levels of nitric oxide to improve erections (so I’m told). So if music is causing some deep-seated stirring below, this may be why.
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Post by ROWUK on Aug 25, 2019 7:42:13 GMT 10
Perhaps first some personal experiences. I very much enjoy my audio playback - even after a live concert where I am in the audience or as a trumpeter on stage. When I come home from work frustrated or tired, selected recordings can bring me back to "tolerable". This may have to do with the pleasure of successfully DIYourselfing the entire playback chain, special recordings or simply not being interrupted for at least 45 minutes... Good knowledge of a recording makes the "outcome" during listening predictable. This is not possible during a live concert where we do not know what distractions may occur.
Yamaha did some research in the late 70s and early 80s where they checked children for the ability to recognize pitch and sing notes that were played. They discovered that in homes where there was continual background "noise" (random radio or TV), the children had a harder time than the kids from families that that had specific listening events.
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 25, 2019 11:54:58 GMT 10
Yamaha did some research in the late 70s and early 80s where they checked children for the ability to recognize pitch and sing notes that were played. They discovered that in homes where there was continual background "noise" (random radio or TV), the children had a harder time than the kids from families that that had specific listening events. Interesting. One wonders why this would be i.e for example training in the form of "specific listening events" vs training in perceiving isolated sounds out of a blended mixture of background sounds (ala ASA). If the "specific listening events" were time spent learning an instrument instead of watching TV, then that would seem to make sense. David -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Post by ROWUK on Aug 25, 2019 20:07:21 GMT 10
Maybe if we do not give our brain and ears a rest, they never have time to sort out events in an organised way. Even when playing trumpet, there is a level of saturation that gives me the need for a break.
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jkenny
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About Me: Audio equipment designer forever in pursuit of more realistic & engaging music reproduction purely because of the extra enjoyment of music created by such reproduction.
http://Ciunas.biz
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Post by jkenny on Aug 27, 2019 10:42:14 GMT 10
Yamaha did some research in the late 70s and early 80s where they checked children for the ability to recognize pitch and sing notes that were played. They discovered that in homes where there was continual background "noise" (random radio or TV), the children had a harder time than the kids from families that that had specific listening events. Interesting. One wonders why this would be i.e for example training in the form of "specific listening events" vs training in perceiving isolated sounds out of a blended mixture of background sounds (ala ASA). If the "specific listening events" were time spent learning an instrument instead of watching TV, then that would seem to make sense. David ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Something that is related to this called " Perceptual narrowing is a developmental process during which the brain uses environmental experiences to shape perceptual abilities." I saw an interesting TV series a while back about childhood development & they showed perceptual experiments which seemed to indicate that children under 6-8 months were able to distinguish between different language phonemes that older children (>8months) & adults could no longer distinguish. "they become less able to distinguish phonemes of nonnative languages and more responsive to their native language.[8] This is presumably due to infants experiencing their native language often, while not getting much experience with non-native languages" I reckon this happens with sounds in general, not just language but language development in children is a fascinating area in itself - I have a 2 year old grandson & I've observed how important sound is to him - he notices the sound of everything - how reverberant the room is (he will sometimes shout something just to hear this) - the sound of his footsteps on different surfaces, etc. It's interesting how early this attention to sound started
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jkenny
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Posts: 83
About Me: Audio equipment designer forever in pursuit of more realistic & engaging music reproduction purely because of the extra enjoyment of music created by such reproduction.
http://Ciunas.biz
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Post by jkenny on Aug 27, 2019 11:38:50 GMT 10
I'm not advocating drug use but from my experience of LSD I was always of the impression that in smaller doses which weren't producing hallucinations, there was a dropping of some filters that are normally at play in our everyday perceptions such that when I looked at a pavement I could see patterns in the pavement - I was aware that it was my brain creating those patterns because it was in a more active state of processing than normal. MY readings on perception indicate that pattern matching is a very important & crucial element in perceptual processing & it's one of the reasons that music appeals to us, I believe? We hear the pattern in the music & almost predict what note or chord will come next but are often delighted when a different note or chord takes us in a different auditory direction Anyway, here's something I recently came across which kinda fits in with perceptual narrowing & how LSD (& other psychotropic drugs) may actually be re-invigorating some of the neural pathways that have fallen into disuse? We Have The Best Evidence Yet That Psychedelic Drugs Can Repair Broken Neural Networks
I believe the article came from this academic paper Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural Plasticity
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Post by cj66 on Aug 27, 2019 22:25:09 GMT 10
Interesting articles.
As far as "filtering" is concerned there has to be some mileage there.
Who has not noticed that music at home is more enjoyable when nicely relaxed after a couple of "drams"!
During our normal day we are bombarded with multi sensory stimuli so to then be able to filter out some of that and allow just one of the senses full reign could be giving it " greater bandwidth" !? More actual information getting through plus less distraction.
Many times I have settled in front of the HiFi or donned decent headphones with a book or article I wanted to read. Nearly every time one of those activities will break through as dominant, leaving the other in the background.
An exception to this is performing a task, mental or physical, Where music actually aids the process. Filtered for focus?
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 28, 2019 13:16:57 GMT 10
Something that is related to this called " Perceptual narrowing is a developmental process during which the brain uses environmental experiences to shape perceptual abilities." I saw an interesting TV series a while back about childhood development & they showed perceptual experiments which seemed to indicate that children under 6-8 months were able to distinguish between different language phonemes that older children (>8months) & adults could no longer distinguish. "they become less able to distinguish phonemes of nonnative languages and more responsive to their native language.[8] This is presumably due to infants experiencing their native language often, while not getting much experience with non-native languages" I reckon this happens with sounds in general, not just language but language development in children is a fascinating area in itself - I have a 2 year old grandson & I've observed how important sound is to him - he notices the sound of everything - how reverberant the room is (he will sometimes shout something just to hear this) - the sound of his footsteps on different surfaces, etc. It's interesting how early this attention to sound started Yes, absolutely agree. I believe Kay Shalemay at Harvard was saying this when she talked about " “All humans come into the world with an innate capability for music. At a very early age, this capability is shaped by the music system of the culture in which a child is raised. "
In speech, it appears we are born with the ability to make all the sounds of all languages. I cant find the reference but researchers were of the view that a lot of a baby's garbled utterances reflect this wide range of vocalisations. As we get older we lose the ability to articulate sounds not required for our particular language. For similar reasons some adults never lose their accent when speaking even fluently in another tongue even after living in a foreign country for 50 years. How hard can it be right? Even a 5 year old can do it effortlessly....if born in the country.!
It gets back to neuroplasticity and what is innately hard wired into our brains vs acquired. We know some synaptic pathways will get pruned if not used. Sometimes this can be an adaptive response of sorts such as with amblyopia. If one eye is not focusing properly or is otherwise not performing for some reason, like a "lazy eye squint" then the brain just starts to ignore that eye. A kind of central visual problem not unlike some stroke sufferers experience. One might well argue it is a maladaptive adaptation for sure but like perceptual narrowing the brain discards what it doesnt need. If you dont use it you lose it.
David ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "All music is folk music. I ain't never heard no horse sing a song." - - Louis Armstrong
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 28, 2019 13:52:05 GMT 10
I'm not advocating drug use but from my experience of LSD I was always of the impression that in smaller doses which weren't producing hallucinations, there was a dropping of some filters that are normally at play in our everyday perceptions such that when I looked at a pavement I could see patterns in the pavement - I was aware that it was my brain creating those patterns because it was in a more active state of processing than normal. MY readings on perception indicate that pattern matching is a very important & crucial element in perceptual processing & it's one of the reasons that music appeals to us, I believe? We hear the pattern in the music & almost predict what note or chord will come next but are often delighted when a different note or chord takes us in a different auditory direction Anyway, here's something I recently came across which kinda fits in with perceptual narrowing & how LSD (& other psychotropic drugs) may actually be re-invigorating some of the neural pathways that have fallen into disuse? We Have The Best Evidence Yet That Psychedelic Drugs Can Repair Broken Neural Networks
I believe the article came from this academic paper Psychedelics Promote Structural and Functional Neural PlasticityYeh I don't think anyone would argue that psychedelics alter perception, indeed hallucinogens totally create a new perception. Its not a great stretch I suppose to imagine increased dendrite proliferation but I imagine that other sensory stimulation will do the same.
There has been much written about sensory stimulation and whole occupational therapy approaches developed as a form of treatment.
To be honest, I haven't seen spectacular results but not saying its not worthwile. I doubt though that we will get OT's handing out Special K (ketamine) at therapy sessions!
Ketamine was used in the article you linked. It is an interesting psychedelic drug. It has been used in Depression but not mainstream and very much frowned upon by some. It is also used by some (not me) to treat an unusual pain condition CRPS (Complex regional pain syndrome) due to its ability to block NMDA receptors. These receptors and their neorotransmitters are implicated in synaptic plasticity and memory function. Most forms of chronic pain involve maladative central nervous sytem processing in the form of "central sensitisation" and in theory K was felt to reduce this. Again, IME it has been disappointing from observing others that use this intervention.
There's no doubt psychedelics have been explored for therapeutic purposes ala Timothy Leary and that music has been composed under the influence of psychedelics.
Like the Moody Blues said:
Timothy Leary's dead No, no, he's outside looking in Timothy Leary's dead No, no, he's outside looking in
He'll fly his astral planes Takes you trips around the bay Brings you back the same day Timothy Leary, Timothy Leary Along the coast you'll hear them boast About a light they say that shines so clear So raise your glass, we'll drink a toast To the little man who sells you thrills along the pier
He'll take you up, he'll bring you down He'll plant your feet back firmly on the ground He flies so high, he swoops so low He knows exactly which way he's gonna go
Songwriters: Ray Thomas
David ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "All music is folk music. I ain't never heard no horse sing a song." - - Louis Armstrong
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Post by Audiophile Neuroscience on Aug 28, 2019 14:01:03 GMT 10
Interesting articles. An exception to this is performing a task, mental or physical, Where music actually aids the process. Filtered for focus? Music does stimulate motor areas and can for example allow someone with Parkinsons, otherwise frozen to one spot on the ground, walk relatively freely. I guess whether it filters or focuses will depend on the task ie whether it interferes or facilitates. David ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "All music is folk music. I ain't never heard no horse sing a song." - - Louis Armstrong
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jkenny
Full Member
Posts: 83
About Me: Audio equipment designer forever in pursuit of more realistic & engaging music reproduction purely because of the extra enjoyment of music created by such reproduction.
http://Ciunas.biz
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Post by jkenny on Aug 28, 2019 22:55:40 GMT 10
Interesting articles. As far as "filtering" is concerned there has to be some mileage there. Who has not noticed that music at home is more enjoyable when nicely relaxed after a couple of "drams"! During our normal day we are bombarded with multi sensory stimuli so to then be able to filter out some of that and allow just one of the senses full reign could be giving it " greater bandwidth" !? More actual information getting through plus less distraction. Many times I have settled in front of the HiFi or donned decent headphones with a book or article I wanted to read. Nearly every time one of those activities will break through as dominant, leaving the other in the background. An exception to this is performing a task, mental or physical, Where music actually aids the process. Filtered for focus? Right & to take this further, I believe that the difference between a very good audio playback system & good playback system is about this ability to relax into the music without distraction. What I mean is that there are flaws in audio reproduction which aren't yet being measured correctly but yet our auditory perception is picking them up subconsciously & these flaws cause us to expend more energy in trying to make sense of the auditory scene (see Auditory Scene Analysis thread). We sense this when a system plays all the notes in the correct order but is somehow flat & doesn't hold our attention in the same way as a very good system does
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jkenny
Full Member
Posts: 83
About Me: Audio equipment designer forever in pursuit of more realistic & engaging music reproduction purely because of the extra enjoyment of music created by such reproduction.
http://Ciunas.biz
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Post by jkenny on Aug 28, 2019 23:18:27 GMT 10
@david, I guess my point about LSD was that, through it's mimicking of some neurotransmitter chemicals (serotonin?), it effectively amplifies the synaptic responses - this could be seen as a change in the normal perceptual filtering system we use on a daily basis. These "normal filters" have been amplified & pruned through our everyday experience & exposure - becoming more set as we get older. In some ways these hallucinogens seem to reinvigorate the neuronal pathways that have been in abeyance since the "filtering" has been established throughout our development.
Yes, agreed that children's vocalisation starts as random sounds then attempts at repeating heard sounds in speech, then through repetition, correction & refinement, somewhat intelligent speech emanates & finally reasonably grammatically correct speech emerges. The power of heuristic learning is a powerful technique that we, as organisms, seem to use in all our contact with the world - auditory perception & acquisition of speech to name just two.
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