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Music semantics refers to the ability of music to convey semantic meaning. Semantics are a key feature of language, and whether music shares some of the same ability to prime and convey meaning has been the subject of recent study. [1]
Primate vocalizations are mainly determined by music-like features (such as pitch, amplitude-and frequency-modulations, timbre and rhythm), and it is assumed that human musical abilities played a key phylogenetical part in the evolution of language. Likewise, it is assumed that, ontogenetically, infants’ first steps into language are based on prosodic information, and that musical communication in early childhood (such as maternal music) has a major role for emotional, cognitive and social development of children. The music faculty is in some respects unique to the human species; only humans compose music, learn to play musical instruments and play instruments cooperatively together in groups. Playing a musical instrument in a group is a tremendously demanding task for the human brain that potentially engages all cognitive processes that we are aware of. It involves perception, action, learning, memory, emotion, etc., making music an ideal tool to investigate human cognition and the underlying brain mechanisms. The relatively young discipline of 'neurocognition of music' includes a wide field of biopsychological research, beginning with the investigation of psychoacoustics and the neural coding of sounds, and ending with brain functions underlying cognition and emotion during the perception and production of highly complex musical information.
A sentence such as Sissy sings a song disburdens the neural processing of semantically related words like music, whereas it does not alleviate processing of semantically unrelated words like carpet. This effect is known as the semantic priming effect; it refers to the highly consistent processing advantage seen for words that are preceded by a semantically related context. This semantic processing effect is electrophysically reflected by the N400 component of event related potential (ERP) measurements. The N400 is a negative polarity ERP component that is maximal over centro-parietal electrode sites. It emerges at around 250 ms after the onset of word stimulation and reaches is maximal amplitude at about 400 ms. When a word is preceded by a semantic context, the amplitude of the N400 is inversely related to the degree of semantic congruousness between the word and is preceding semantic context. The processing of almost any type of semantically meaningful information seems to be associated with an N400 effect (Kutas, M. et al.: Electrophysiology reveals semantic memory use in language comprehension, Trends Cogn. Sci., 2000).
Semantic information is clearly a key feature of language, but is this kind of information also an important aspect of music?
Most music theorists posit at least four different aspects of musical meaning:
Most linguists, however, would reject the notion that music can transfer specific semantic concepts (Pinker, Norton, New York 1997, How the Mind Works). Though the study of Koelsch et al. in 2004 could provide strong behavioural and electrophysiological evidence that music is able to transfer semantic information.
Intuitively, it seems plausible that certain passages of Holst´s The Planets or Beethoven´s symphonies prime the word "hero", rather than the word "flea". As primes Koelsch et al., as already mentioned above, used sentences and musical excerpts that were, with respect to their meaning, either related or unrelated to a target word. Half of the targets were abstract, the other half were concrete words. Most of the stimuli that primed concrete words resembled sounds (e.g., bird) or qualities of objects (e.g., low tones associated with basement or ascending pitch steps associated with staircase). Some musical stimuli (especially those used as primes for abstract words) resembled prosodic and possibly gestural cues that can be associated with particular words (e.g., sigh, consolation). Other stimuli presented stereotypic musical forms or styles that are commonly associated with particular words (e.g., a church anthem and the word devotion).
Importantly, participants were not familiar with the musical excerpts, so meaning could not simply be ascribed by extra-musical associations that had an explicit, direct link to language (such as titles or lyrics). As priming of words could not rely on direct associations between musical primes and target words, Koelsch et al. were enabled to investigate whether the N400 can also be elicited by stimuli that are not directly linked to language.
Behaviourally, subjects categorized 92% of the target words correctly when target words were presented after a sentence. When target words were preceded by musical excerpts, 80% of the targets were categorized correctly. Further behavioural data was collected by a pre-experiment in which the subjects had to rate the semantic relatedness between prime and target words by using a scale ranging from -5 to +5, and an additional experiment in which the subjects were instructed to choose the word semantically most closely related to the prime out of a five-word list. The Pre-experiment and the additional experiment could maintain the results of the behavioural performance during the first EEG experiment.
Semantic processing was measured using EEG (ElectroEncephaloGram). Target words elicited an N400 when elicited after semantically unrelated sentences. Likewise, an N400 effect was elicited when target words were preceded by semantically unrelated musical excerpts, showing that music can transfer semantically meaningful information by priming representations of meaningful concepts. The ERPs of the target words showed, as expected, larger N400s when the targets were presented after semantically unrelated sentences compared to those after semantically related sentences. As when preceded by the sentences, the target words also elicited larger N400s when presented after an unrelated musical excerpt compared to when presented after a related excerpt. In both, language and music, both concrete and abstract target words elicited significant N400 effects.
The N400 effect (that means, the effect of unprimed versus primed target words) did not differ between the language domain (sentences followed by target words) and the music domain (musical excerpts followed by target words), concerning amplitude, latency or scalp distribution. In both domains, a bilateral N400 was maximal around 410ms over centro-parietal electrode sites. The N400 effects did not differ between the prime-target pairs with and without balanced content, neither in the language nor in the music domain. This findings rules out the possibility that the musical excerpts merely primed an emotional state that was (in)consistent with the emotional content of the target word.
The sources of electric brain activity underlying the N400 effect did not statistically differ between the language and the music domain, neither with respect to locations, nor with respect to orientations, strengths, time point of maximum or explanation of variance. The source analysis of the N400 effect indicated generators located in the posterior portion of the middle temporal gyrus (MTG, Brodmann´s area 21/37), quite close to the superior temporal sulcus. This localization concurs with numerous studies on the functional neuroanatomy of semantic processes at the level of both words and sentences.
Neurolinguistics is the study of neural mechanisms in the human brain that control the comprehension, production, and acquisition of language. As an interdisciplinary field, neurolinguistics draws methods and theories from fields such as neuroscience, linguistics, cognitive science, communication disorders and neuropsychology. Researchers are drawn to the field from a variety of backgrounds, bringing along a variety of experimental techniques as well as widely varying theoretical perspectives. Much work in neurolinguistics is informed by models in psycholinguistics and theoretical linguistics, and is focused on investigating how the brain can implement the processes that theoretical and psycholinguistics propose are necessary in producing and comprehending language. Neurolinguists study the physiological mechanisms by which the brain processes information related to language, and evaluate linguistic and psycholinguistic theories, using aphasiology, brain imaging, electrophysiology, and computer modeling.
Brodmann area 45 (BA45), is part of the frontal cortex in the human brain. It is situated on the lateral surface, inferior to BA9 and adjacent to BA46.
The N400 is a component of time-locked EEG signals known as event-related potentials (ERP). It is a negative-going deflection that peaks around 400 milliseconds post-stimulus onset, although it can extend from 250-500 ms, and is typically maximal over centro-parietal electrode sites. The N400 is part of the normal brain response to words and other meaningful stimuli, including visual and auditory words, sign language signs, pictures, faces, environmental sounds, and smells.
The lexical decision task (LDT) is a procedure used in many psychology and psycholinguistics experiments. The basic procedure involves measuring how quickly people classify stimuli as words or nonwords.
Sentence processing takes place whenever a reader or listener processes a language utterance, either in isolation or in the context of a conversation or a text. Many studies of the human language comprehension process have focused on reading of single utterances (sentences) without context. Extensive research has shown that language comprehension is affected by context preceding a given utterance as well as many other factors.
The P600 is an event-related potential (ERP) component, or peak in electrical brain activity measured by electroencephalography (EEG). It is a language-relevant ERP component and is thought to be elicited by hearing or reading grammatical errors and other syntactic anomalies. Therefore, it is a common topic of study in neurolinguistic experiments investigating sentence processing in the human brain.
The early left anterior negativity is an event-related potential in electroencephalography (EEG), or component of brain activity that occurs in response to a certain kind of stimulus. It is characterized by a negative-going wave that peaks around 200 milliseconds or less after the onset of a stimulus, and most often occurs in response to linguistic stimuli that violate word-category or phrase structure rules. As such, it is frequently a topic of study in neurolinguistics experiments, specifically in areas such as sentence processing. While it is frequently used in language research, there is no evidence yet that it is necessarily a language-specific phenomenon.
Priming is the idea that exposure to one stimulus may influence a response to a subsequent stimulus, without conscious guidance or intention. The priming effect refers to the positive or negative effect of a rapidly presented stimulus on the processing of a second stimulus that appears shortly after. Generally speaking, the generation of priming effect depends on the existence of some positive or negative relationship between priming and target stimuli. For example, the word nurse might be recognized more quickly following the word doctor than following the word bread. Priming can be perceptual, associative, repetitive, positive, negative, affective, semantic, or conceptual. Priming effects involve word recognition, semantic processing, attention, unconscious processing, and many other issues, and are related to differences in various writing systems. Research, however, has yet to firmly establish the duration of priming effects, yet their onset can be almost instantaneous.
In neuroscience, the lateralized readiness potential (LRP) is an event-related brain potential, or increase in electrical activity at the surface of the brain, that is thought to reflect the preparation of motor activity on a certain side of the body; in other words, it is a spike in the electrical activity of the brain that happens when a person gets ready to move one arm, leg, or foot. It is a special form of bereitschaftspotential. LRPs are recorded using electroencephalography (EEG) and have numerous applications in cognitive neuroscience.
Difference due to memory (Dm) indexes differences in neural activity during the study phase of an experiment for items that subsequently are remembered compared to items that are later forgotten. It is mainly discussed as an event-related potential (ERP) effect that appears in studies employing a subsequent memory paradigm, in which ERPs are recorded when a participant is studying a list of materials and trials are sorted as a function of whether they go on to be remembered or not in the test phase. For meaningful study material, such as words or line drawings, items that are subsequently remembered typically elicit a more positive waveform during the study phase. This difference typically occurs in the range of 400–800 milliseconds (ms) and is generally greatest over centro-parietal recording sites, although these characteristics are modulated by many factors.
In neuroscience, the visual P200 or P2 is a waveform component or feature of the event-related potential (ERP) measured at the human scalp. Like other potential changes measurable from the scalp, this effect is believed to reflect the post-synaptic activity of a specific neural process. The P2 component, also known as the P200, is so named because it is a positive going electrical potential that peaks at about 200 milliseconds after the onset of some external stimulus. This component is often distributed around the centro-frontal and the parieto-occipital areas of the scalp. It is generally found to be maximal around the vertex of the scalp, however there have been some topographical differences noted in ERP studies of the P2 in different experimental conditions.
The N200, or N2, is an event-related potential (ERP) component. An ERP can be monitored using a non-invasive electroencephalography (EEG) cap that is fitted over the scalp on human subjects. An EEG cap allows researchers and clinicians to monitor the minute electrical activity that reaches the surface of the scalp from post-synaptic potentials in neurons, which fluctuate in relation to cognitive processing. EEG provides millisecond-level temporal resolution and is therefore known as one of the most direct measures of covert mental operations in the brain. The N200 in particular is a negative-going wave that peaks 200-350ms post-stimulus and is found primarily over anterior scalp sites. Past research focused on the N200 as a mismatch detector, but it has also been found to reflect executive cognitive control functions, and has recently been used in the study of language.
Change deafness is a perceptual phenomenon that occurs when, under certain circumstances, a physical change in an auditory stimulus goes unnoticed by the listener. There is uncertainty regarding the mechanisms by which changes to auditory stimuli go undetected, though scientific research has been done to determine the levels of processing at which these consciously undetected auditory changes are actually encoded. An understanding of the mechanisms underlying change deafness could offer insight on issues such as the completeness of our representation of the auditory environment, the limitations of the auditory perceptual system, and the relationship between the auditory system and memory. The phenomenon of change deafness is thought to be related to the interactions between high and low level processes that produce conscious experiences of auditory soundscapes.
Bilingual interactive activation plus (BIA+) is a model for understanding the process of bilingual language comprehension and consists of two interactive subsystems: the word identification subsystem and task/decision subsystem. It is the successor of the Bilingual Interactive Activation (BIA) model which was updated in 2002 to include phonologic and semantic lexical representations, revise the role of language nodes, and specify the purely bottom-up nature of bilingual language processing.
Linguistic prediction is a phenomenon in psycholinguistics occurring whenever information about a word or other linguistic unit is activated before that unit is actually encountered. Evidence from eyetracking, event-related potentials, and other experimental methods indicates that in addition to integrating each subsequent word into the context formed by previously encountered words, language users may, under certain conditions, try to predict upcoming words. In particular, prediction seems to occur regularly when the context of a sentence greatly limits the possible words that have not yet been revealed. For instance, a person listening to a sentence like, "In the summer it is hot, and in the winter it is..." would be highly likely to predict the sentence completion "cold" in advance of actually hearing it. A form of prediction is also thought to occur in some types of lexical priming, a phenomenon whereby a word becomes easier to process if it is preceded by a related word. Linguistic prediction is an active area of research in psycholinguistics and cognitive neuroscience.
A Jabberwocky sentence is a type of sentence of interest in neurolinguistics. Jabberwocky sentences take their name from the language of Lewis Carroll's well-known poem "Jabberwocky". In the poem, Carroll uses correct English grammar and syntax, but many of the words are made up and merely suggest meaning. A Jabberwocky sentence is therefore a sentence which uses correct grammar and syntax but contains nonsense words, rendering it semantically meaningless.
Embodied cognition occurs when an organism's sensorimotor capacities, body and environment play an important role in thinking. The way in which a person's body and their surroundings interacts also allows for specific brain functions to develop and in the future to be able to act. This means that not only does the mind influence the body's movements, but the body also influences the abilities of the mind, also termed the bi-directional hypothesis. There are three generalizations that are assumed to be true relating to embodied cognition. A person's motor system is activated when (1) they observe manipulable objects, (2) process action verbs, and (3) observe another individual's movements.
Bilingual lexical access is an area of psycholinguistics that studies the activation or retrieval process of the mental lexicon for bilingual people.
The bi-directional hypothesis of language and action proposes that the sensorimotor and language comprehension areas of the brain exert reciprocal influence over one another. This hypothesis argues that areas of the brain involved in movement and sensation, as well as movement itself, influence cognitive processes such as language comprehension. In addition, the reverse effect is argued, where it is proposed that language comprehension influences movement and sensation. Proponents of the bi-directional hypothesis of language and action conduct and interpret linguistic, cognitive, and movement studies within the framework of embodied cognition and embodied language processing. Embodied language developed from embodied cognition, and proposes that sensorimotor systems are not only involved in the comprehension of language, but that they are necessary for understanding the semantic meaning of words.
Seana Coulson is a cognitive scientist known for her research on the neurobiology of language and studies of how meaning is constructed in human language, including experimental pragmatics, concepts, semantics, and metaphors. She is a professor in the Cognitive Science department at University of California, San Diego, where her Brain and Cognition Laboratory focuses on the cognitive neuroscience of language and reasoning.
This article incorporates material from the Citizendium article "Musical semantics", which is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License but not under the GFDL.
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