Melancholia In 100 Words

The British Journal of Psychiatry have a regular series called "In 100 Words", which produces some gems. This month they have Melanchola in 100 Words, featuring perhaps the most influential musician you haven't heard of, Robert Johnson.

I got stones in my pathway/And my road seems dark at night/I have pains in my heart/They have taken my appetite.

Robert Johnson, known as the King of the Delta blues singers, distilled into these lines the essence of severe depressive illness – somatic ills, fear and suspicion, emotional and physical pain, nocturnal troubles and struggle against obstacles. The words are one with the powerful, haunting music. ICD-10 and DSM-IV have their place, but poets have often been there before us, and done a better job. We can all learn from Robert Johnson, born just 100 years ago.

I've previously written about the blues and what shade of blue they were talking about, here. But this actually isn't the first Melancholia in 100 Words to appear in the BJP. Here's another one from 2009

Melancholia is a classical episodic depressive disorder that combines mood, psychomotor, cognitive and vegetative components with high suicide risk. In the present psychiatric classification it is buried as a modifier in both bipolar and unipolar depressions. It is hardly used to characterise patients in the clinic or research.

The syndrome is frequently recognised in delusional and agitated depression, and in the elderly. Cortisol or sleep EEG abnormalities are prognostically helpful. Melancholia is particularly responsive to tricyclic antidepressants and electroconvulsive therapy but not to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors or psychotherapy. Recognising melancholia as a distinct disorder improves clinical care and research.

Melancholia In 100 Words

The British Journal of Psychiatry have a regular series called "In 100 Words", which produces some gems. This month they have Melanchola in 100 Words, featuring perhaps the most influential musician you haven't heard of, Robert Johnson.

I got stones in my pathway/And my road seems dark at night/I have pains in my heart/They have taken my appetite.

Robert Johnson, known as the King of the Delta blues singers, distilled into these lines the essence of severe depressive illness – somatic ills, fear and suspicion, emotional and physical pain, nocturnal troubles and struggle against obstacles. The words are one with the powerful, haunting music. ICD-10 and DSM-IV have their place, but poets have often been there before us, and done a better job. We can all learn from Robert Johnson, born just 100 years ago.

I've previously written about the blues and what shade of blue they were talking about, here. But this actually isn't the first Melancholia in 100 Words to appear in the BJP. Here's another one from 2009

Melancholia is a classical episodic depressive disorder that combines mood, psychomotor, cognitive and vegetative components with high suicide risk. In the present psychiatric classification it is buried as a modifier in both bipolar and unipolar depressions. It is hardly used to characterise patients in the clinic or research.

The syndrome is frequently recognised in delusional and agitated depression, and in the elderly. Cortisol or sleep EEG abnormalities are prognostically helpful. Melancholia is particularly responsive to tricyclic antidepressants and electroconvulsive therapy but not to selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors or psychotherapy. Recognising melancholia as a distinct disorder improves clinical care and research.

Music, Part I

I've been asked to write a post on my music preferences. I have to confess that music tastes are very weird. Of course, I can always hide behind the word "eclectic", but "weird" is more honest a term to describe them. So from now on, I will be sharing my favorite music from time to time. I promise not to do it too often because I know that some people (myself included) hate blogs that are filled with an endless succession of videos.

I don't know if I shared this before, but I'm a huge opera lover. Today, I want to offer to your attention my absolutely favorite aria ever performed by the amazing Luciano Pavarotti. It comes from Leoncavallo's opera Pagliacci and is called "Vesti la giubba."

One thing to remember is that no recording can possibly capture Pavarotti's amazing voice. I had the incredible luck to attend the great singer's live concert some years ago and I have to tell you that it was an experience I cannot describe with words.

I have probably listened to this aria hundreds of times, but it makes me cry every single time I listen to it. I just watched this video for the purposes of this blog and I'm in tears again. Just this one short aria is enough to redeem the entire human civilization, in my opinion.

Turn That Off, I'm Writing

I listen to a lot of music.

Music is playing in the background most of the time whether I'm on the computer or not (thanks to my old, poorly-designed but still faithful Shuffle). However I've noticed that I find myself turning off iTunes when I'm writing.

Right now, for example, I have just put this song on pause because I'm writing this post (a post about why I paused that song - bit of a chicken-and-egg situation there.) I can't write with a song on, because the lyrics would be distracting.

However, I don't always do this when I'm typing. With some songs, and some kinds of writing, it's OK. I think this is how it works:

Instrumental songs are obviously OK. But I don't listen to many.

More interestingly, songs I've listened to many times are fine. I've just put on this which, according to iTunes, I have listened to no fewer than 140 times over the last three years. And this is fine. No distraction. I think the reason must be that I'm so used to the lyrics that the language part of my mind no longer needs to work out what they mean.

Some kinds of writing are compatible with songs. Blogging isn't and writing "important" emails aren't but a lot of emails are. Which I guess means that I'm not really putting much effort into writing them. I must be typing on auto-pilot, just repeating stock phrases ("Sounds good") rather than actually using my language areas, or at least, not using them very hard.

Psychologists are fond of using these kinds of selective distraction tasks to map out the architecture of the mind e.g. verbal ones distract verbal working memory but not spatial, and vice versa. So this is all pretty standard stuff, but what's interesting is that it's not intuitively obvious.

It doesn't feel like sometimes when I'm writing my language faculty is hard at work, and other times it's not. It feels like I'm thinking about what I type all the time. It's just typing. Sometimes I'll be replying to a bunch of emails, music on full blast, and then I'll find myself putting it on pause when I get to one particular email; but I couldn't tell you in advance which one it would be. It just feels right. Better turn the music off for this one, this one's serious - though even that's putting it too strongly. It doesn't feel serious, it just feels like the music needs to be off.

Our concious experience is smooth and seamless even though we're constantly switching between using different parts of our brains. This becomes all too evident in the case of brain lesions, which can rob us of capacities we never knew we had, because they were always there when we needed them. Some lesions, for example, render you completely unaware of anything that happens to your left. It doesn't seem like we're using a different part of our brain when dealing with stuff on the left as opposed to the right - but we are.

Turn That Off, I'm Writing

I listen to a lot of music.

Music is playing in the background most of the time whether I'm on the computer or not (thanks to my old, poorly-designed but still faithful Shuffle). However I've noticed that I find myself turning off iTunes when I'm writing.

Right now, for example, I have just put this song on pause because I'm writing this post (a post about why I paused that song - bit of a chicken-and-egg situation there.) I can't write with a song on, because the lyrics would be distracting.

However, I don't always do this when I'm typing. With some songs, and some kinds of writing, it's OK. I think this is how it works:

Instrumental songs are obviously OK. But I don't listen to many.

More interestingly, songs I've listened to many times are fine. I've just put on this which, according to iTunes, I have listened to no fewer than 140 times over the last three years. And this is fine. No distraction. I think the reason must be that I'm so used to the lyrics that the language part of my mind no longer needs to work out what they mean.

Some kinds of writing are compatible with songs. Blogging isn't and writing "important" emails aren't but a lot of emails are. Which I guess means that I'm not really putting much effort into writing them. I must be typing on auto-pilot, just repeating stock phrases ("Sounds good") rather than actually using my language areas, or at least, not using them very hard.

Psychologists are fond of using these kinds of selective distraction tasks to map out the architecture of the mind e.g. verbal ones distract verbal working memory but not spatial, and vice versa. So this is all pretty standard stuff, but what's interesting is that it's not intuitively obvious.

It doesn't feel like sometimes when I'm writing my language faculty is hard at work, and other times it's not. It feels like I'm thinking about what I type all the time. It's just typing. Sometimes I'll be replying to a bunch of emails, music on full blast, and then I'll find myself putting it on pause when I get to one particular email; but I couldn't tell you in advance which one it would be. It just feels right. Better turn the music off for this one, this one's serious - though even that's putting it too strongly. It doesn't feel serious, it just feels like the music needs to be off.

Our concious experience is smooth and seamless even though we're constantly switching between using different parts of our brains. This becomes all too evident in the case of brain lesions, which can rob us of capacities we never knew we had, because they were always there when we needed them. Some lesions, for example, render you completely unaware of anything that happens to your left. It doesn't seem like we're using a different part of our brain when dealing with stuff on the left as opposed to the right - but we are.

Neural Correlates of 80s Hip Hop

A ground-breaking new study reveals the neurological basis of seminal East Coast hip-hop pioneers Run-D.M.C.

The study is Diffusion tensor imaging of the hippocampus and verbal memory performance: The RUN DMC Study, and it actually has nothing to do with hip-hop, but it does have one of the best study acronyms I have ever seen.

RUN DMC stands for the "Radboud University Nijmegen Diffusion tensor and Magnetic resonance imaging Cohort study".

Or maybe it does relate to rapping. Because the paper is about verbal memory, and if there's one thing a rapper needs, it's a good memory for words, otherwise they'd forget their lyrics and... OK no, it doesn't relate to hip-hop.

It is however a very nice piece of research. They took no fewer than 503 elderly people - making this by far the single biggest neuroimaging study I have ever read. They used DTI to measure the quality of white-matter tracts in the brain and correlated this with verbal memory function. DTI is an extremely clever technique which allows you to measure the integrity of white matter pathways.

The theory behind the study is that in elderly people, white matter often shows degeneration. This is thought to be caused by vascular disease - problems with the blood flow to the brain, such as cerebral small-vessel disease which means, essentially, a series of mild strokes, which often go unnoticed at the time, but they build up to cause brain damage, specifically white matter disruption.

The symptoms of this are extremely varied and can range from cognitive and memory impairment, to depression, to motor problems (clumsiness), all depending on where in the brain it happens.

All of the people in this study had cerebral small-vessel disease as defined on the basis of symptoms and the presence of visible white matter lesions on the basic MRI scan. The authors found that the integrity of the white matter tracts in the area of the hippocampus, as measured with DTI, correlated with performance on a simple word learning task:


The healthier the hippocampal white matter, the better people did on the task. This makes sense as the hippocampus is a well known memory centre. This is only a correlation, and doesn't prove that the hippocampal damage caused the memory problems, but it seems entirely plausible. The authors controlled for things like age, gender, and the size of the hippocampus, as far as possible.

Should we all be worried about our white matter when we get older? Quite possibly - but luckily, the risk factors for vascular disease are quite well understood, and many of them are things you can change by having a healthy lifestyle.

Smoking is bad news, as are hypertension (high blood pressure), obesity, and high cholesterol. Diabetes is also a risk factor. So you should quit smoking, eat well, and ensure that you're getting tested and if necessary treated for hypertension and diabetes. All of which, of course, is a good idea from the point of view of general health as well.




van Norden AG, de Laat KF, Fick I, van Uden IW, van Oudheusden LJ, Gons RA, Norris DG, Zwiers MP, Kessels RP, & de Leeuw FE (2011). Diffusion tensor imaging of the hippocampus and verbal memory performance: The RUN DMC Study. Human brain mapping PMID: 21391278

Neural Correlates of 80s Hip Hop

A ground-breaking new study reveals the neurological basis of seminal East Coast hip-hop pioneers Run-D.M.C.

The study is Diffusion tensor imaging of the hippocampus and verbal memory performance: The RUN DMC Study, and it actually has nothing to do with hip-hop, but it does have one of the best study acronyms I have ever seen.

RUN DMC stands for the "Radboud University Nijmegen Diffusion tensor and Magnetic resonance imaging Cohort study".

Or maybe it does relate to rapping. Because the paper is about verbal memory, and if there's one thing a rapper needs, it's a good memory for words, otherwise they'd forget their lyrics and... OK no, it doesn't relate to hip-hop.

It is however a very nice piece of research. They took no fewer than 503 elderly people - making this by far the single biggest neuroimaging study I have ever read. They used DTI to measure the quality of white-matter tracts in the brain and correlated this with verbal memory function. DTI is an extremely clever technique which allows you to measure the integrity of white matter pathways.

The theory behind the study is that in elderly people, white matter often shows degeneration. This is thought to be caused by vascular disease - problems with the blood flow to the brain, such as cerebral small-vessel disease which means, essentially, a series of mild strokes, which often go unnoticed at the time, but they build up to cause brain damage, specifically white matter disruption.

The symptoms of this are extremely varied and can range from cognitive and memory impairment, to depression, to motor problems (clumsiness), all depending on where in the brain it happens.

All of the people in this study had cerebral small-vessel disease as defined on the basis of symptoms and the presence of visible white matter lesions on the basic MRI scan. The authors found that the integrity of the white matter tracts in the area of the hippocampus, as measured with DTI, correlated with performance on a simple word learning task:


The healthier the hippocampal white matter, the better people did on the task. This makes sense as the hippocampus is a well known memory centre. This is only a correlation, and doesn't prove that the hippocampal damage caused the memory problems, but it seems entirely plausible. The authors controlled for things like age, gender, and the size of the hippocampus, as far as possible.

Should we all be worried about our white matter when we get older? Quite possibly - but luckily, the risk factors for vascular disease are quite well understood, and many of them are things you can change by having a healthy lifestyle.

Smoking is bad news, as are hypertension (high blood pressure), obesity, and high cholesterol. Diabetes is also a risk factor. So you should quit smoking, eat well, and ensure that you're getting tested and if necessary treated for hypertension and diabetes. All of which, of course, is a good idea from the point of view of general health as well.




van Norden AG, de Laat KF, Fick I, van Uden IW, van Oudheusden LJ, Gons RA, Norris DG, Zwiers MP, Kessels RP, & de Leeuw FE (2011). Diffusion tensor imaging of the hippocampus and verbal memory performance: The RUN DMC Study. Human brain mapping PMID: 21391278

Brain Stimulation Can Stop the Rock

Isn't it annoying when you get a song stuck in your head? Like, say, this one:

Stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, can't stop the rock
You can't stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, can't stop the rock
You can't stop the rock, can't stop the rock. etc.

- Apollo 440, "Stop the Rock"

You'll probably be stuck with that tune for a few minutes, but with any luck it'll go away eventually. However, for the 63-year old Italian man reported on in a new paper by Cosentino et al., the melodic misery never stopped.

The patient had suffered from partial hearing loss for 20 years, probably as a result of his work as a stonemason, which involved a lot of loud noise. His real problems started, however, when he suffered a car accident which cause damage to his right temporal pole. This caused

continuous musical hallucinations in the form of popular songs by Renato Carosone ... the songs were the ones he often used to listen to when he was younger. The volume of the musical hallucinations was initially low, and then became progressively louder; it was perceived in the middle of head and changed in severity over the course of the day. The intensity of the hallucinations evaluated through an arbitrary scale ranging from 0 (no hallucinations) to 10 (unbearable hallucinations) varied from 5 to 8 during the day.

The spectral songs didn't directly interfere with his life, but they were extremely annoying. He reported no other symptoms, his hearing was no worse than it had been before the accident, all neuropsychological tests were normal, and he had no history of any neurological or psychiatric problems.

Doctors tried to control the harmonic hallucinations with a range of anti-epileptic drugs, but they didn't work. A PET scan showed reduced brain activity in the area which was damaged, but increased activity in the posterior temporal lobe. Maybe this was to blame for the problems.

So Cosentino et al. decided to use repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to suppress activity in the offending part of the brain. rTMS uses strong magnetic fields to stimulate the brain; through some unknown neurobiological process, it can, in the long term, lead to reduced activity.

rTMS was given 5 days per week for 2 weeks. After the first week, the patient reported that the music had got a lot quieter and after another week, it was gone. A few months later it started again, but far quieter than before and only occasionally. The patient was offered more treatment but he said it wouldn't be worth it, because the hallucinations were no longer annoying. A second PET scan showed normalization of the activity...maybe (see the picture above; A=before B=after.)

There was no placebo condition, so it's hard to know whether this was a true effect of the magnetic stimulation, but the fact that a number of drugs hadn't worked suggests that it wasn't merely a placebo effect. So it turns out that you can Stop the Rock. Or at least, you can Stop the Canzone Napoletana of Renato Carosone. Whether the Rock is harder to Stop is a topic for future research.

Cosentino, G., Giglia, G., Palermo, A., Panetta, M., Lo Baido, R., Brighina, F., & Fierro, B. (2010). A case of post-traumatic complex auditory hallucinosis treated with rTMS Neurocase, 16 (3), 267-272 DOI: 10.1080/13554790903456191

Brain Stimulation Can Stop the Rock

Isn't it annoying when you get a song stuck in your head? Like, say, this one:

Stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, can't stop the rock
You can't stop the rock, stop the rock
Stop the rock, can't stop the rock
You can't stop the rock, can't stop the rock. etc.

- Apollo 440, "Stop the Rock"

You'll probably be stuck with that tune for a few minutes, but with any luck it'll go away eventually. However, for the 63-year old Italian man reported on in a new paper by Cosentino et al., the melodic misery never stopped.

The patient had suffered from partial hearing loss for 20 years, probably as a result of his work as a stonemason, which involved a lot of loud noise. His real problems started, however, when he suffered a car accident which cause damage to his right temporal pole. This caused

continuous musical hallucinations in the form of popular songs by Renato Carosone ... the songs were the ones he often used to listen to when he was younger. The volume of the musical hallucinations was initially low, and then became progressively louder; it was perceived in the middle of head and changed in severity over the course of the day. The intensity of the hallucinations evaluated through an arbitrary scale ranging from 0 (no hallucinations) to 10 (unbearable hallucinations) varied from 5 to 8 during the day.

The spectral songs didn't directly interfere with his life, but they were extremely annoying. He reported no other symptoms, his hearing was no worse than it had been before the accident, all neuropsychological tests were normal, and he had no history of any neurological or psychiatric problems.

Doctors tried to control the harmonic hallucinations with a range of anti-epileptic drugs, but they didn't work. A PET scan showed reduced brain activity in the area which was damaged, but increased activity in the posterior temporal lobe. Maybe this was to blame for the problems.

So Cosentino et al. decided to use repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to suppress activity in the offending part of the brain. rTMS uses strong magnetic fields to stimulate the brain; through some unknown neurobiological process, it can, in the long term, lead to reduced activity.

rTMS was given 5 days per week for 2 weeks. After the first week, the patient reported that the music had got a lot quieter and after another week, it was gone. A few months later it started again, but far quieter than before and only occasionally. The patient was offered more treatment but he said it wouldn't be worth it, because the hallucinations were no longer annoying. A second PET scan showed normalization of the activity...maybe (see the picture above; A=before B=after.)

There was no placebo condition, so it's hard to know whether this was a true effect of the magnetic stimulation, but the fact that a number of drugs hadn't worked suggests that it wasn't merely a placebo effect. So it turns out that you can Stop the Rock. Or at least, you can Stop the Canzone Napoletana of Renato Carosone. Whether the Rock is harder to Stop is a topic for future research.

Cosentino, G., Giglia, G., Palermo, A., Panetta, M., Lo Baido, R., Brighina, F., & Fierro, B. (2010). A case of post-traumatic complex auditory hallucinosis treated with rTMS Neurocase, 16 (3), 267-272 DOI: 10.1080/13554790903456191

Music

Tonight I'm going to my Dad's concert with him. I'm really excited! This is 1 of his last concerts for the season. I'm sad about that. But I'm happy to go see him play. One day I want to play in the symphony with him. My Dad keeps telling me if I practice enough, I'll get there. I practice a lot. Because I want to play in the symphony too! :) C

Busy Week

I'm still tired from last week. But I had a lot of fun! It was fun to see Joe again. He used to live here too. In our town. But his dad got transferred and they moved to Utah. But we still see each other at the different conferences. My Dad pays for him to go. He thinks it's important for us to learn about our culture.

Our show went really well on Saturday. Sunday we went to see lots of groups perform. We got to sing too! And my Dad and me ate lots of food! That's our favorite thing to do at things like this. I also bought lots of jewelry, monos, and ribbons. We got my Nana some too! She likes these earrings.

Joe went home early Monday morning. We came home later in the afternoon. Our bags are still at the door! We haven't unpacked. Because I had to go back to school yesterday. And my Dad went back to work.

Last night we had a long dance rehearsal. I'm glad we don't have one today. I'm really tired. And I got all my homework done before we came back. I'm ahead of my classes because my Dad got my work before we left. I finished it. And my classes haven't gotten that far yet!

Tonight I think I'm going to bed early. I'm really tired. But we had so much fun last week! It's just sad that it only happens a few times a year! There are 4 conferences that I like to go to most. I'm glad my Dad teaches at them and that I get to go. :) C

Our Big Show

Tonight is our big show. I get to wear a pretty dress like these ones. I think ours are even more beautiful! They have lots and lots of lace. My Dad was trying to steam mine this morning. And our aprons have lots of embroidery and sequence on them. I just wish my Nana was here to do my hair. She is really good at that.

My Tia Alicia is going to help me. And she brought lots of hairspray and bobbie pins. There is a hairpiece that you have to put in. I hope mine doesn't fall out! We also have to dance with a candle on top of our heads. I've done it a lot of times. But it still kind of scares me!

But I'm excited for tonight. We have a rehearsal in a little while for the show. Joe and I have to practice out duet too! I'm not worried about that. Because we have sung together before. I'm just really excited for the show! :) C

Learning A Lot!

I've been learning a lot here at the conference. Joe and I have been practicing our duet. We get to sing tomorrow night for the big dinner. And we are singing Friday-Sunday. It's really exciting!

Our dance group has learned a lot of new dances too! Marissa is having a lot of fun. But she is still made that they don't let her dance with the candles. She has to dance with a vaso of agua. All of my tios are teaching like my Dad. It's really a lot of fun here. :)

I'm most excited for Saturday night's show. My tios are performing a big show too! We get to dance for part of it. The whole conference is fun. I'm glad my Dad brings me. And I'm glad he pays for Joe to come too!

We're getting ready to go for dinner. I'm really hungry today. My pansa keeps making noise. I hope we go somewhere with good food. :) C

I'm Excited!

My Dad and I are at the airport. We're going to the Mariachi Conference this week. We get to see lots of friends! My Nono is going to be teaching too! I can't wait to see him! I wish my Nana was coming. But she has school and work. So she couldn't come.

My dance school gets to come too. But they're not coming until tomorrow. My Dad has to be there tomorrow. Because he's teaching. The teachers have a special rehearsal tomorrow. That's why we're going to be there early.

You should see all the bags we have! I have 2 suitcases with just my dresses, hair pieces, and shoes! My Dad and me each have a regular suitcase. Then we have a garment bag with both of our Mariachi Trajes. And we have our 2 violins. My Dad also has his briefcase for his music and laptop!

We are going to be gone until next Monday. But I'm excited to go! I'm taking the dance classes. But I'm also going to study voice. And my Dad is going to be teaching me the violin stuff in the evenings. This is going to be a lot of fun! I can't wait to see Joe. We're singing a duet too! :) C

Birthday Party

Yesterday we had a big birthday party at our house. It was for Maribel, Lauren, my Nana, and me. All of our birthdays are close together. And Lauren and Maribel's moms just had babies. Their birthday parties were supposed to be last weekend. But my Nana and my Tio Berto asked us if we could make them all at the same time. Since that is when the babies started to come. I was really excited! And my Dad said it was OK to have all the parties together.

Maribel and Lauren turned 3. I turned 12. I'm not sure how old my Nana is. But she is 20 something. Tio Berto asked me to keep the secret. We surprised my Nana. She thought the party was just for us 3 girls. But Tio Berto bought my Nana a big birthday cake, her own pinata, and lots of presents. :)

Our birthday parties are always Matanzas too. That's when you kill a pig and cook it. Early yesterday morning, all my tios and my Dad killed 3 pigs. And then they started to cook. They're really good at it. 2 of the pigs had been at my Tio Berto's house. And 1 had been here. We fatten them up until the day they kill them. My favorite part, are the chicharrones. It's pretty much fried pork fat. But it tastes good in fresh tortillas. :)

Everyone had a lot of fun! My tios played too! They're mariachis. And my Nana sang with them. They even got Maribel to sing a song. She's getting really good! There was a lot of dancing and eating. And we got to see both sets of twins. They came for a little while on their way home.

This was my best birthday ever! I got to spend it with a lot of people I love. And I got to share my birthday party with my 2 friends and my Nana! :) C

IHOP and the Symphony

I went with my Dad to work tonight. He plays in the symphony. It was a beautiful concert. I'm super glad that my Dad let me go with him. After the concert we stopped at IHOP. We shared crepes and pancakes. I had strawberry crepes. They're my favorite. And my Dad had pancakes. They were good too! It's late right now. But we're on our way home. My Dad and I had such a fun time tonight! :) C

The Neuroscience of MySpace

How does popularity affect how we judge music?

We tend to say we like what other people like. No-one wants to stand out and risk ridicule by saying they don't enjoy universally loved bands, like The Beatles... unless they're trying to fit into a subculture where everyone hates The Beatles.

But do people just pretend to like what others like, or can perceived popularity actually change musical preferences? Do The Beatles actually sound better because we know everyone loves them? An amusing Neuroimage study from Berns et al aimed to answer this question with the help of 27 American teens, an fMRI scanner, and MySpace.

The teens were played 15 second clips of music, and had to rate each one a 5 star scale of quality. Before the experiment they listed their preferred musical genres, and they were only given music from genres they liked. To make sure no-one had heard the songs before, the researchers went on MySpace and found unsigned artists...

A total of 20 songs were downloaded in each of the following genres: Rock, Country, Alternative/Emo/Indie, Hip-Hop/Rap, Jazz/Blues, and Metal (identified by the MySpace category).

The twist was that each song was played twice: the first time with no information about its popularity, and then again, either with or without a 5 star popularity score shown on the screen. Cleverly, this was based on the number of MySpace downloads. This meant that the subjects had a chance to change their rating based on what they'd just learned about the song's popularity.

What happened? Compared to doing nothing, hearing music activated large chunks of the brain, which is not very surprising. In some areas, activity correlated with how highly the listener rated the song:

The regions showing activity correlated with likability were largely distinct from the auditory network and were restricted to bilateral caudate nuclei, and right lateral prefrontal cortices (middle and inferior gyri). Negative correlations with likability were observed in bilateral supramarginal gyri, left insula, and several small frontal regions.

The headline result is that a song's popularity did not correlate with activity in this "liking music network", and nor did activity in these areas correlate with each teen's individual "conformism" score, i.e. how willing they were to change their ratings in response to learning about the song's popularity. Berns et al interpreted this as meaning that, in this experiment, popularity did not affect whether the volunteers really enjoyed the songs or not.

Instead, activity in some other areas was associated with conformism:

we found a positive interaction in bilateral anterior insula, ACC/SMA, and frontal poles. Given the known roles of the anterior insula and ACC in the cortical pain matrix, this suggests that feelings of anxiety accompanied the act of conforming....Interestingly, the negative interaction revealed significant differences in the middle temporal gyrus... the popularity sensitive individuals showed significantly less activation. This suggests that sensitivity to popularity is also linked to less active listening.

*

This paper is a good example of using neuroimaging data to try to test psychological theories, in this case, the theory that social pressure influences musical enjoyment. This is makes it better than many fMRI studies because, as I have warned, without a theory to test it's all too easy to just make up a psychological story to explain any given pattern of neural responses.

But there's still an element of this here: the authors suggest that conformism is motivated by anxiety, not because anyone reported suffering anxiety, but purely because it was associated with activity in the anterior insula etc. This is putting a lot of faith in the idea that anterior insula etc activity means anxiety - it could mean a lot of other things. There's also the question of whether letting people rate the songs for the first time before telling them about the popularity is the best way of measuring social pressures.

The most serious omission in this study, however, is that we're not told about the correlations between music preference and conformism. The world needs to know: are kids who like "Alternative/Emo/Indie" music free-thinkers, or are they really the biggest conformists of all? The paper doesn't tell us. In the absence of empirical evidence, we'll have to rely on South Park...

Stan: But if life is only pain, then...what's the point of living?
Fringe-flicking Goth: Just to make life more miserable for the conformists. (flicks fringe)
Stan: Alright, so how do I join you?
Goth Leader: If you wanna be one of the non-conformists, all you have to do is dress just like us and listen to the same music we do.
- South Park, "Raisins"

Berns, G., Capra, C., Moore, S., & Noussair, C. (2010). Neural mechanisms of the influence of popularity on adolescent ratings of music NeuroImage, 49 (3), 2687-2696 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.10.070

The Neuroscience of MySpace

How does popularity affect how we judge music?

We tend to say we like what other people like. No-one wants to stand out and risk ridicule by saying they don't enjoy universally loved bands, like The Beatles... unless they're trying to fit into a subculture where everyone hates The Beatles.

But do people just pretend to like what others like, or can perceived popularity actually change musical preferences? Do The Beatles actually sound better because we know everyone loves them? An amusing Neuroimage study from Berns et al aimed to answer this question with the help of 27 American teens, an fMRI scanner, and MySpace.

The teens were played 15 second clips of music, and had to rate each one a 5 star scale of quality. Before the experiment they listed their preferred musical genres, and they were only given music from genres they liked. To make sure no-one had heard the songs before, the researchers went on MySpace and found unsigned artists...

A total of 20 songs were downloaded in each of the following genres: Rock, Country, Alternative/Emo/Indie, Hip-Hop/Rap, Jazz/Blues, and Metal (identified by the MySpace category).

The twist was that each song was played twice: the first time with no information about its popularity, and then again, either with or without a 5 star popularity score shown on the screen. Cleverly, this was based on the number of MySpace downloads. This meant that the subjects had a chance to change their rating based on what they'd just learned about the song's popularity.

What happened? Compared to doing nothing, hearing music activated large chunks of the brain, which is not very surprising. In some areas, activity correlated with how highly the listener rated the song:

The regions showing activity correlated with likability were largely distinct from the auditory network and were restricted to bilateral caudate nuclei, and right lateral prefrontal cortices (middle and inferior gyri). Negative correlations with likability were observed in bilateral supramarginal gyri, left insula, and several small frontal regions.

The headline result is that a song's popularity did not correlate with activity in this "liking music network", and nor did activity in these areas correlate with each teen's individual "conformism" score, i.e. how willing they were to change their ratings in response to learning about the song's popularity. Berns et al interpreted this as meaning that, in this experiment, popularity did not affect whether the volunteers really enjoyed the songs or not.

Instead, activity in some other areas was associated with conformism:

we found a positive interaction in bilateral anterior insula, ACC/SMA, and frontal poles. Given the known roles of the anterior insula and ACC in the cortical pain matrix, this suggests that feelings of anxiety accompanied the act of conforming....Interestingly, the negative interaction revealed significant differences in the middle temporal gyrus... the popularity sensitive individuals showed significantly less activation. This suggests that sensitivity to popularity is also linked to less active listening.

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This paper is a good example of using neuroimaging data to try to test psychological theories, in this case, the theory that social pressure influences musical enjoyment. This is makes it better than many fMRI studies because, as I have warned, without a theory to test it's all too easy to just make up a psychological story to explain any given pattern of neural responses.

But there's still an element of this here: the authors suggest that conformism is motivated by anxiety, not because anyone reported suffering anxiety, but purely because it was associated with activity in the anterior insula etc. This is putting a lot of faith in the idea that anterior insula etc activity means anxiety - it could mean a lot of other things. There's also the question of whether letting people rate the songs for the first time before telling them about the popularity is the best way of measuring social pressures.

The most serious omission in this study, however, is that we're not told about the correlations between music preference and conformism. The world needs to know: are kids who like "Alternative/Emo/Indie" music free-thinkers, or are they really the biggest conformists of all? The paper doesn't tell us. In the absence of empirical evidence, we'll have to rely on South Park...

Stan: But if life is only pain, then...what's the point of living?
Fringe-flicking Goth: Just to make life more miserable for the conformists. (flicks fringe)
Stan: Alright, so how do I join you?
Goth Leader: If you wanna be one of the non-conformists, all you have to do is dress just like us and listen to the same music we do.
- South Park, "Raisins"

Berns, G., Capra, C., Moore, S., & Noussair, C. (2010). Neural mechanisms of the influence of popularity on adolescent ratings of music NeuroImage, 49 (3), 2687-2696 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.10.070

Recording

Tonight I got to go with my Nono. He was doing some recording at the studio. He got to do his singing tonight. It was so much fun to watch him work! And he has such a beautiful voice. :)

His group is recording a new CD. And it was really neat to watch them put it together. I'm glad I got to go. They even let my Nono and I record a song together. I know it wasn't as professional as the stuff they are working on. But it was fun.

And now I have a CD of my Nono and me singing! It's really special. I'm glad the other guys were there too. Because they did all the music. I had a lot of fun! I'm so glad we got to come. I'll never forget tonight. :) C

Making Music from fMRI

I've just come across the brilliant work of Dan Lloyd, a philosopher and neuroscientist who's turned fMRI data into music-like sounds:

More videos can be found here. Lloyd doesn't seem to have written or published anything about it yet, but I'm sure that's in the works.

Traditionally, fMRI data is shown as a pattern of colored patches overlayed on a picture on the brain. This emphasizes the spatial, where of the neural activity. But it glosses over the fact that there is also a temporal, when side to it.

Listening to Lloyd's soundscapes, the ever-changing nature of the neural signal is very obvious. Some of the variation over time is just random noise, of course. But some of it represents real, ongoing changes in brain activity. So while turning neuroimaging data into music is undeniably cool, it could also be a more useful way of presenting the data for some purposes.

Via New Scientist, Eavesdropping on the Music of the Brain.