Musician Brains Are Cool

    It is well known that learning a musical instrument has positive effects on cognitive ability, memory, and neuroplasticity (Hille et al., 2011; Moreno & Bidelman, 2014). A particularly interesting benefit that musicians have is the ability to consolidate motor skills without having to go through a sleep-wake cycle (Tucker et al., 2016). This study published in 2016 used a fine motor skill in the form of repeated key press sequences over thirty second trials. As expected, musicians performed better than non-musicians, but they also had an unexpected skill. They were not limited by the need to sleep in order to strengthen the skills that were learned that day. Musicians' retesting performance increased even after multiple hours awake with no time spent asleep. Non-musicians did not appear to have this ability. The non-musicians in this study had to go through a full night of sleep to begin consolidating their skills in the fine-motor task. Furthermore, their full night of sleep did not garner the same improvement that even wake-time did for musicians. Musician increase in skill following a full night of sleep was far beyond that of non-musicians. This is a very interesting finding as it suggests that musician brains have increased neuroplasticity almost immediately following exposure to fine-motor skill testing. This conversation can be extended to the process of long-term potentiation as well. We know that fine-motor skills are a good indicator for later success in academic skills such as science scores, reading, and math skills (Grimmer et al., 2010). We also know that that the ability to play an instrument positively influences other important skills such as working memory and intelligence (Moreno & Bidelman, 2014). Is it possible that the simple (not so simple) act of continually mastering an instrument puts musicians at a great advantage when it comes to learning and strengthening neuronal connections? What do you think? I've personally met quite a few musicians that could easily debunk this claim, but I have to admit the majority of dedicated musicians seem to be particularly perceptive and intelligent. Also, let's talk about the ethics of incorporating music into our school curriculum. I would argue that preserving musical programs such as orchestra, band, and choir in schools represents beneficence as it provides an excellent way to encourage multiple intelligences especially in our younger students. Is it ethical to defund and remove musical programs from schools knowing the great benefits it has for student intelligence and success? I would say removing these programs does not represent non-malfeasance since it results in some amount of harm. It especially harms those few, committed students who took their instruments and musical studies seriously!

References: 
1. Hille, K., Gust, K., Bitz, U., & Kammer, T. (2011). Associations between music education, intelligence, and spelling ability in elementary school. Advances in cognitive psychology, 7, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.2478/v10053-008-0082-4

2. Moreno, S., & Bidelman, G. M. (2014). Examining neural plasticity and cognitive benefit through the unique lens of musical training. Hearing research, 308, 84–97. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heares.2013.09.012

3. Tucker, M. A., Nguyen, N., & Stickgold, R. (2016). Experience Playing a Musical Instrument and Overnight Sleep Enhance Performance on a Sequential Typing Task. PloS one, 11(7), e0159608. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0159608

4. Grissmer, D., Grimm, K. J., Aiyer, S. M., Murrah, W. M., & Steele, J. S. (2010). Fine motor skills and early comprehension of the world: two new school readiness indicators. Developmental psychology, 46(5), 1008–1017. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0020104