A two-year study by researchers at the Brain and Imagination Institute (BCI) at the University of Southern California reveals that direct exposure to music and music instruction accelerates the brain development of young kids in the areas accountable for language development, sound, checking out ability and speech understanding.
The research study of 6-7-year-old children began in 2012, when neuroscientists started keeping track of a group of 37 kids from an impoverished area of Los Angeles. Thirteen of them received music direction through the Youth Orchestra Los Angeles Program where they practiced up to seven hours each week.
Eleven children were registered in a community-based soccer program, and another 13 children were not included in any training program at all.
The scientists compared the 3 groups by tracking the electrical activity in the brains, conducting behavioral screening and kept an eye on changes using brain scans.
The results revealed that the auditory systems of the kids in the music program had accelerated much faster than the other kids not taken part in music. Dr. Assal Habibi, the lead author of the research study and a senior research associate at the BCI, explained that the auditory system is stimulated by music and the system is also taken part in general noise processing. This is vital to checking out skills, language advancement and successful communication.
Source: Music Education Functions