Abstract

Aging is often associated with decline in brain processing power and neural predictive capabilities. To challenge this notion, we used magnetoencephalography (MEG) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to record the whole-brain activity of 39 older adults (over 60 years old) and 37 young adults (aged 18–25 years) during recognition of previously memorised and varied musical sequences. Results reveal that when recognising memorised sequences, the brain of older compared to young adults reshapes its functional organisation. In fact, it shows increased early activity in sensory regions such as the left auditory cortex (100 ms and 250 ms after each note), and only moderate decreased activity (350 ms) in medial temporal lobe and prefrontal regions. When processing the varied sequences, older adults show a marked reduction of the fast-scale functionality (250 ms after each note) of higher-order brain regions including hippocampus, ventromedial prefrontal and inferior temporal cortices, while no differences are observed in the auditory cortex. Accordingly, young outperform older adults in the recognition of novel sequences, while no behavioural differences are observed with regards to memorised ones. Our findings show age-related neural changes in predictive and memory processes, integrating existing theories on compensatory neural mechanisms in non-pathological aging.

MEG shows that the aging brain reshapes its functional organisation during musical sequence recognition, with increased sensory regions activity and reduced memory regions functionality, indicating novel neural compensatory mechanisms in aging.

Details

Title
Age-related neural changes underlying long-term recognition of musical sequences
Author
Bonetti, Leonardo 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Fernández-Rubio, Gemma 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Lumaca, Massimo 2 ; Carlomagno, Francesco 3   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Risgaard Olsen, Emma 2 ; Criscuolo, Antonio 4 ; Kotz, Sonja A. 4   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Vuust, Peter 2 ; Brattico, Elvira 3   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Kringelbach, Morten L. 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

 Aarhus University & The Royal Academy of Music, Center for Music in the Brain, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark (GRID:grid.7048.b) (ISNI:0000 0001 1956 2722); University of Oxford, Centre for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing, Linacre College, Oxford, UK (GRID:grid.4991.5) (ISNI:0000 0004 1936 8948); University of Oxford, Department of Psychiatry, Oxford, UK (GRID:grid.4991.5) (ISNI:0000 0004 1936 8948) 
 Aarhus University & The Royal Academy of Music, Center for Music in the Brain, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark (GRID:grid.7048.b) (ISNI:0000 0001 1956 2722) 
 Aarhus University & The Royal Academy of Music, Center for Music in the Brain, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus/Aalborg, Aarhus, Denmark (GRID:grid.7048.b) (ISNI:0000 0001 1956 2722); University of Bari Aldo Moro, Department of Education, Psychology, Communication, Bari, Italy (GRID:grid.7644.1) (ISNI:0000 0001 0120 3326) 
 Maastricht University, Department of Neuropsychology and Psychopharmacology, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht, The Netherlands (GRID:grid.5012.6) (ISNI:0000 0001 0481 6099) 
Pages
1036
Publication year
2024
Publication date
2024
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
23993642
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
3098516059
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2024. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.