ArticlePLoS biology2014
The evolutionary biology of musical rhythm: was Darwin wrong?
Article in PLoS biology, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 71 papers.
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Who cites it
71 citing papers in PubMed.
- Critical Review on the Development and Evolution of Beat Perception.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2026Review
- Rhythmic skills mediate the link between music training and cognition via attention and phonological processing.Communications psychology · 2026Article
- Eye blinks synchronize with musical beats during music listening.PLoS biology · 2025Article
- The comparative effects of Cantonese and Mandarin tone language backgrounds on musical pitch perception.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Sensorimotor synchronization to rhythm in an experienced sea lion rivals that of humans.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- The shared genetic architecture and evolution of human language and musical rhythm.Nature human behaviour · 2025Article
- The groove hypothesis-music and dance reimagined: A sensory motor synchronization study.PloS one · 2025Article
- Rhythmic Roots: The Adaptive Functions of Vocal Isochrony and Its Role in Human Music and Language Evolution.Psihologijske teme = Psychological themes = Psychological topics · 2025Article
- Rats synchronize predictively to metronomes.iScience · 2024Article
- Article
- Biological principles for music and mental health.Translational psychiatry · 2023Review
- The shared genetic architecture and evolution of human language and musical rhythm.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023Article
- Music can be reconstructed from human auditory cortex activity using nonlinear decoding models.PLoS biology · 2023Article
- Auditory-motor synchronization varies among individuals and is critically shaped by acoustic features.Communications biology · 2023Article
- Measuring rhythms of vocal interactions: a proof of principle in harbour seal pups.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Phylogenic evolution of beat perception and synchronization: a comparative neuroscience perspective.Frontiers in systems neuroscience · 2023Review
- Why art? The role of arts in arts and health.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Article
- Spontaneous beat synchronization in rats: Neural dynamics and motor entrainment.Science advances · 2022Article
- Sustained visual attention improves visuomotor timing.Psychological research · 2022Article
- Anticipatory regulation of cardiovascular system on the emergence of auditory-motor interaction in young infants.Experimental brain research · 2022Article
11 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
In The Descent of Man, Darwin speculated that our capacity for musical rhythm reflects basic aspects of brain function broadly shared among animals. Although this remains an appealing idea, it is being challenged by modern cross-species research. This research hints that our capacity to synchronize to a beat, i.e., to move in time with a perceived pulse in a manner that is predictive and flexible across a broad range of tempi, may be shared by only a few other species. Is this really the case? If so, it would have important implications for our understanding of the evolution of human musicality.
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