Nursing News:
Rock-a-Bye Babies develop music appreciation at a very early age

Study shows how even infants develop a love of music
By E.J. MUNDELL, HealthDay Reporter
The hand that rocks the cradle may also trigger a lifelong love of music, rhythm and dance, a new Canadian study finds.
Research involving moms cuddling and bouncing happy 7-month-olds suggests their shared attraction to music may be based on much more than the sound that enters their ears. ³Our findings provide evidence that the experience of body movement plays an important role in musical rhythm perception,² concluded researchers Laurel Trainor, a professor in the department of psychology at McMaster University, in Hamilton, Ontario, and graduate student Jessica Phillips-Silver. While it may seem like child¹s play, the study ‹ published in the June 3 issue of Science ‹ brings intriguing new insights into how the brain simultaneously uses multiple sensory systems to tune into music.
³Up till now, all studies of music have really just studied the auditory system,² Trainor explained. ³But if you think about where music came from, its evolution and how we practice it and move to it ‹ how we like to actually go to a concert and see musicians performing ‹ clearly, there are other systems involved.² And those systems may start coordinating from the very beginning of life, the researchers believe. In their study, Trainor and Phillips-Silver had mother-infant pairs listen to a simple two-minute piece of music with a rather ambiguous rhythm.
Some mothers were instructed to bounce their babies in a kind of ³military march² time (ONE-two-ONE-two-ONE), while others bounced their tot in waltz time (ONE-two-three-ONE-two-three). The music was then replayed with special rhythmic accents to mark it as either a march or waltz. The researchers watched closely to see which version each baby would prefer. Because 7-month-old infants can¹t verbalize their preferences, the researchers relied on a simple technique: When a baby looked at a specific light, the researchers turned on the ³march² piece. But if they looked at a second light, the ³waltz² music started to play.
Trainor and Phillips-Silver found that babies whose moms had rocked and bounced them to the march beat strongly preferred that version of the melody. On the other hand, infants who first heard melody while being waltzed in their mother¹s arms preferred that version of the song. In a third experiment, the researchers had the babies listen to the music while simply watching their moms move to the beat ‹ without being rocked or held.
Those babies showed no preference for either the march or the waltz, suggesting to the researchers that ³the movement of the infant¹s own body was critical² to his or her response to music. All of these findings suggest babies ³are getting concurrent sound and movement experience² that influences their perception of rhythm and music, Trainor said. She believes a whole array of neurological systems ‹ auditory, visual, proprioceptive (the body¹s sense of itself) and vestibular (movement and balance) ‹ are working in harmony to help humans process and enjoy the musical experience. ³I think we¹re wired for it,² said Alice Sterling Honig, a professor of psychology at Syracuse University, and an expert in both early child development and music. ³All our senses are able to be wired into the motor center and other centers in the brain, and that wiring goes on from the moment the nervous system starts to send those wonderful impulses down those pathways.² She and Trainor also pointed out that a love of rhythmic music ‹ including baby-rocking and lullaby ‹ is innate to all known human cultures.
³In our past work, we¹ve shown that mothers across cultures will sing to their babies, and babies are very responsive to song, very early on,² Trainor added. ³But in doing these studies, one of the things that always struck us was that as mothers are interacting with their infants they are always moving them, rocking them, bouncing them.² ³If that¹s true, the brain should really be wiring itself up according to the experience that it¹s getting,² she said. But why are humans unique among species in their love of music? ³Other animals have vocalizations but as far as we know, no other animas have either music or language,² Trainor said. ³One answer might be that, for humans, music serves a social-emotional function. Certainly if you look at a mother singing and rocking an infant, there¹s a clear emotional exchange going on there.² She said the study leaves unanswered the question of whether a love of music is hard-wired or learned. Trainor believes both may be true. ³Certainly without the experience of music you won¹t develop an appreciation for it,² she said. ³But you also have to have this brain structure that is already wired up to respond to that stimulation. You need both.²
For more on music and the human mind, head to the American Psychological Association.