Fractionating the musical mind: insights from congenital amusia.
Music, like language, is acquired effortlessly in early life and fulfils a multitude of social, cultural and emotional functions. However, those with a disorder recently termed 'congenital amusia' (CA) fail to recognise common tunes from their culture, do not hear when notes are 'out of tune' and sometimes report that music sounds like a 'din' or 'banging'. The core deficit appears to be a problem in discriminating pitch direction, a building block for the representation of melodic contour. Familial studies suggest the disorder is heritable and associated with structural differences in temporal and frontal cortices. The disorder provides a window onto the neuro-cognitive architecture of musical processing, and the possible etiologies of disordered development.
Stewart
Lauren
L
Department of Psychology, University of London, New Cross, London SE14 6NW, UK. l.stewart@gold.ac.uk
D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D001308:Auditory Perceptual Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000502:physiology; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D009146:Music / Q000523:psychology*; D010897:Pitch Discrimination / Q000502:physiology; D010898:Pitch Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000502:physiology