Every day since the second
week of September 2021, I find myself playing the guitar more than I normally
do. It has certainly helped me deal with the rigors of this program. Every
morning before class, I play my electric guitar which mostly involves music
from Story of The Year, Thirty Seconds from Mars, Linkin Park, Korn, a variety
of 80’s new wave/synthpop bands and multiple 90’s grudge bands. Every night, I
play my acoustic guitar, which I would serenade myself with love songs from
Chris Isaak, Howie Day, Ed Sheeran, Rob Thomas from Matchbox 20, and Maroon 5.
Obviously, listening to music elicits activity in certain cortices of your brain. Increases in oxytocin levels is unquestionably incredible and that it is particularly useful in alleviating symptoms associated with psychological disorders. However, I felt that playing a musical instrument does more for me than just listening to music by itself. My motor manual dexterity (which I need for dental school) and active listening skills has definitely improved. My concentration and memory were also better than the days I didn’t play.
I found a study Brain Structures Differ between Musicians and Non-Musicians that compared gray matter volume differences in visual-spatial brain regions for both musicians and non-musicians. The results from this study indicated that musicians had higher gray matter than non-musicians which was not surprising to me at all. However, this article led me another article Musical Instrument Practice Predicts White Matter Microstructure and Cognitive Abilities in Childhood by Loui, Raine, Chaddock-Heyman, Kramer, and Hillman. The results from this study proposes that the relationship between musical daily practice and intellectual capacity is related to axonal fibers in white matter pathways in the auditory-motor system. This means that IQ capacity had increased due to the increase in white matter during child development from playing an instrument. This is interesting because if your child plays an instrument, other aspects of their life would improve.
So overall, what did I learn from these articles? That my future children are going to learn how to play 5 different instruments whether they like it or not.
Gaser, C., &
Schlaug, G. (2003). Brain Structures Differ between Musicians and
Non-Musicians. In The Journal of Neuroscience (Vol. 23, Issue 27, pp.
9240–9245). Society for Neuroscience. https://doi.org/10.1523/jneurosci.23-27-09240.2003
Loui, P., Raine, L. B.,
Chaddock-Heyman, L., Kramer, A. F., & Hillman, C. H. (2019). Musical
Instrument Practice Predicts White Matter Microstructure and Cognitive
Abilities in Childhood. In Frontiers in Psychology (Vol. 10). Frontiers Media
SA. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01198
Tuan, you finding something to chill and relax to, while trying to survive all this craziness is super beneficial to your overall health. You sir are experiencing what we read about in TBL 1 for physiology. Remember when we were talking about neurons, LTP, and such. Your brain has undergone the process of remapping. Your neurons are expanding and sprouting to allow an increased amount of your auditory cortex that will become devoted to process the sound of music. In this case you didn’t lose any neuron projections but instead under these normal conditions have decided to project neurons that activate the auditory cortex even further. I’ll tell you it feels like I am the opposite with some brain cells being lost and now I am just compensating by asking my neurons to invade these blank areas. But that’s beside the point. The point is you have shown that LTP and neuron expansion is occurring in every person each day in this program. We all are using our neurons in different ways, and it is just awesome to see it in action. P.S. your music choice is top of the line, greats songs for the guitar.
ReplyDeleteArticle: TBL #1 Nervous System
I remembered when I first learned how to play, my fingers would hurt so bad that I was not able to write for awhile. I eventually created calluses on my fingers which helped mitigate the pain. You're right that I was able to create LTP pathways to my brain. Also I am sure that I created other efferent LTP pathways when I was learning to perfect my finger placement on the guitar strings. Now, I don't even look at my fingers when playing anymore because I know that the efferent neuronal pathways that I created a long time ago is working properly today. If my fingers were incorrectly placed on the strings, I would be able to hear it immediately from the auditory LTP sensory neurons that I had also created a long time ago too.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, Tuan. It was refreshing to read about your experiences and journey as a guitar player. I remember when I first picked up the guitar my sophomore year of college, I felt a complete change in my mental demeanor. I felt I did better in school, I was a better student, and I was happier in general. I haven’t played in about a year, but it’s something I really need to pick up again. There are so many great benefits to playing guitar, or just instruments in general, for your emotional health, but also the physical health of your brain. Not only is it good for reducing stress, but there are many long-term benefits as well, and listening to or playing music can even serve as non-pharmalogical medical therapy. In fact, I found a literature review that talks about how musical interventions, whether that’s listening or playing, are being used to improve cognitive function in Alzheimer’s patients. Needless to say, your post has definitely inspired me to start playing again!
ReplyDeleteLeggieri, M., Thaut, M. H., Fornazzari, L., Schweizer, T. A., Barfett, J., Munoz, D. G., & Fischer, C. E. (2019). Music Intervention Approaches for Alzheimer's Disease: A Review of the Literature. Frontiers in neuroscience, 13, 132. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2019.00132