2023-04-17 10:02:01
Practicing and actively listening to music curbs cognitive decline in healthy seniors. This is the finding of a Lake Geneva study of 132 retirees enrolled in piano lessons and musical awareness and without any previous practice.
This research led by the University of Geneva (UNIGE), the University of Applied Sciences of Western Switzerland (HES-SO) and the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne (EPFL) was conducted among 132 retirees aged 62 to 78 in good health. One of the conditions of participation was not to have taken music lessons for more than six months during his life.
The participants were randomly divided into two groups. The members of the first group took weekly piano lessons. The members of the second benefited from active listening lessons focusing in particular on the recognition of instruments and the analysis of the structure of works, in a wide range of musical styles, the UNIGE said in a press release on Monday.
Positive effects in both groups
After six months, the scientists found common effects between the two interventions. Neuroimaging revealed, in all participants, an increase in gray matter in four regions of the brain involved in high-level cognitive functioning, in particular in areas of the cerebellum mobilized in working memory.
“Their performance increased by 6% and this result was directly correlated to the plasticity of the cerebellum”, indicates Clara James, private doctor at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences at UNIGE, full professor at the Haute Geneva health school and last author of the study, quoted in the press release. The scientists also found that the quality of sleep, number of classes taken and daily training had an impact on the degree of performance improvement.
The atrophy still continues
A difference was however observed between the two groups: the volume of gray matter remained stable in the right primary auditory cortex of the pianists – a region specialized in the processing of sounds – while it decreased in the active listening group. . A global process of atrophy nevertheless continued in all the participants. “Musical interventions cannot therefore rejuvenate the brain but only slow down the aging of certain of its regions”, specifies Damien Marie, first author of the study.
According to the authors, these interventions, fun and accessible, should become a political priority for supporting healthy ageing. The next step will be to assess the potential of music in people affected by mild neurocognitive decline, an intermediate stage between normal aging and dementia. This work is published in the journal NeuroImage: Reports.
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