The relationship between musical training and the processing of audiovisual correspondences: Evidence from a reaction time task
The relationship between musical training and the processing of audiovisual correspondences: Evidence from a reaction time task
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Date
2023-04-06
Authors
Riku Ihalainen
Georgios Kotsaridis
Vivas A.B.
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Publisher
PLOS ONE
Abstract
Numerous studies have reported both cortical and functional changes for visual, tactile, and
auditory brain areas in musicians, which have been attributed to long-term training induced
neuroplasticity. Previous investigations have reported advantages for musicians in multisensory
processing at the behavioural level, however, multisensory integration with tasks
requiring higher level cognitive processing has not yet been extensively studied. Here, we
investigated the association between musical expertise and the processing of audiovisual
crossmodal correspondences in a decision reaction-time task. The visual display varied in
three dimensions (elevation, symbolic and non-symbolic magnitude), while the auditory
stimulus varied in pitch. Congruency was based on a set of newly learned abstract rules:
“The higher the spatial elevation, the higher the tone”, “the more dots presented, the higher
the tone”, and “the higher the number presented, the higher the tone”, and accuracy and
reaction times were recorded. Musicians were significantly more accurate in their responses
than non-musicians, suggesting an association between long-term musical training and
audiovisual integration. Contrary to what was hypothesized, no differences in reaction times
were found. The musicians’ advantage on accuracy was also observed for rule-based congruency
in seemingly unrelated stimuli (pitch-magnitude). These results suggest an interaction
between implicit and explicit processing–as reflected on reaction times and accuracy,
respectively. This advantage was generalised on congruency in otherwise unrelated stimuli
(pitch-magnitude pairs), suggesting an advantage on processes requiring higher order cognitive
functions. The results support the notion that accuracy and latency measures may
reflect different processes.
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Citation
Ihalainen R, Kotsaridis G, Vivas AB, Paraskevopoulos E (2023) The relationship between musical training and the processing of audiovisual correspondences: Evidence from a reaction time task. PLoS ONE 18(4): e0282691. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282691