How can music training throughout various periods of your life help fight against cognitive decline? How does music training actually strengthen your brain and help executive function?
In this study, Bottcher et al. investigate the association between playing a musical instrument across various periods of your life and the various multi-domain cognitive abilities that are affected by such instruction. There were 140 participants in this study. 70 of them were in the study group, selected based on the frequency of playing a musical instrument across certain periods of their lives. The three periods were ages 13–30, 30–65, and 65+. The other 70 participants were a control group who had not engaged in such musical activity throughout their lives. Cognitive abilities were assessed using various tests, and five cognitive domains, as well as a global cognitive score, were used to compare the two groups. The five domains were learning and memory, working memory, executive functions, mental processing speed, language, and visuospatial abilities, as well as the global cognitive score (the mean across all five categories).
After conducting tests to measure these five cognitive domains, Bottcher et al. found differences across the board. There were significant group differences for global cognition, working memory, executive function, and language and visuospatial abilities. All of these were better in the musical participants compared to those with no activity. They concluded that participation in musical activity, at any point in your life, is “associated with brain and cognitive benefits in late life and could strengthen cognitive resilience” (Bottcher et al.). This means that engaging in musical activities throughout life may help preserve important cognitive abilities as people age, allowing the brain to better maintain its function and adapt to age-related changes.
In this meta-analysis by Rogers et al., the effects that musical instrument training had on executive functions and fluid intelligence were investigated. Through looking at around 13 studies, with a total of 502 participants, they discovered multiple things. First, musical training does positively impact processing speed, attention control, and working memory capacity in healthy older adults. This happens when someone engages in learning a new instrument, even later in life. This active engagement delivers large cognitive benefits, rather than simply playing an instrument that has already been learned.
However, continuous engagement in playing a musical instrument, in this case the piano, showed cognitive benefits as well. Overall, Rogers et al. discovered that attention switching, distractor inhibition, and category-switching verbal fluency were all greater in those who had been exposed to, and continued to play, musical instruments. Training in any instrument has a positive effect on executive functioning. Music training is also suggested to “improve supervisory mechanisms” (Rogers et al.), which essentially means that the areas of the brain that allow for deliberate planning, decision-making, and focus are actually improved with the training of an instrument.
The effect on processing speed was discovered to be the greatest of all these benefits. Improved processing speed is actually something that improves other cognitive domains, so while playing an instrument increases your processing speed, multiple other parts of your brain are simultaneously being improved because of that. The analysis concludes by saying that continuing to learn and play an instrument is likely to lead to long-term benefits.
Together, these studies suggest that musical training does far more than develop musical skill. Whether someone begins training early in life or later in adulthood, learning and continuing to play an instrument strengthens important cognitive abilities such as memory, attention, processing speed, and executive functioning. These findings highlight music as a potentially valuable tool for supporting long-term brain health and cognitive resilience. So go pick up that instrument and start practicing!
