ArticleeNeuro
Binaural Beats through the Auditory Pathway: From Brainstem to Connectivity Patterns.
Article in eNeuro. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 31 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
31 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Pooled it
- Comparison of autonomous sensory meridian response and binaural auditory beats effects on stress reduction: a pilot study.Scientific reports · 2022Trial
- Effects of the Alpha, Beta, and Gamma Binaural Beat Brain Stimulation and Short-Term Training on Simultaneously Assessed Visuospatial and Verbal Working Memories, Signal Detection Measures, Response Times, and Intrasubject Response Time Variabilities: A Within-Subject Randomized Placebo-Controlled Clinical Trial.BioMed research international · 2022Trial
- The effect of binaural beats on phonological awareness and cortical connectivity in dyslexic children.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Article
- Sustained attention in attention-deficit subjects and the impact of binaural beat stimulation evaluated by behavior and EEG.Experimental brain research · 2025Article
- The neurobiology of altered states of consciousness induced by drumming and other rhythmic sound patterns.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2025Review
- Article
- Entrainment of rhythmic tonal sequences on neural oscillations and the impact on subjective emotion.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Analysis of the effect of 6-Hz binaural beats on electroencephalographic and autonomic parameters of healthy individuals: An exploratory study.Physiological reports · 2025Article
- Distinct neural mechanisms of alpha binaural beats and white noise for cognitive enhancement in young adults.AIMS neuroscience · 2025Article
- Impact of binaural beat stimulation on working memory: a graph theory network approach.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2025Article
- Beating stress: music with monaural beats reduces anxiety and improves mood in a non-clinical population.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Enhancing Deep Sleep Induction Through a Wireless In-Ear EEG Device Delivering Binaural Beats and ASMR: A Proof-of-Concept Study.Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Binaural beats at 0.25 Hz shorten the latency to slow-wave sleep during daytime naps.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Comparing the Effectiveness of Cognitive Rehabilitation and Binaural Beats on Craving and Comorbidities of Sexual Hyperactivity: A Pilot, Exploratory Quasi-Experimental Study.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Short-Term Effect of Auditory Stimulation on Neural Activities: A Scoping Review of Longitudinal Electroencephalography and Magnetoencephalography Studies.Brain sciences · 2024Article
- Pentatonic sequences and monaural beats to facilitate relaxation: an EEG study.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Article
- Gamma music: a new acoustic stimulus for gamma-frequency auditory steady-state response.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Binaural beating is a perceptual auditory illusion occurring when presenting two neighboring frequencies to each ear separately. Several controversial claims have been attributed to binaural beats regarding their ability to entrain human brain activity and mood, in both the scientific literature and the marketing realm. Here, we sought to address those questions in a robust fashion using a single-blind, active-controlled protocol. To do so, we compared the effects of binaural beats with a control beat stimulation (monaural beats, known to entrain brain activity but not mood) across four distinct levels in the human auditory pathway: subcortical and cortical entrainment, scalp-level functional connectivity and self-reports. Both stimuli elicited standard subcortical responses at the pure tone frequencies of the stimulus [i.e., frequency following response (FFR)], and entrained the cortex at the beat frequency [i.e., auditory steady state response (ASSR)]. Furthermore, functional connectivity patterns were modulated differentially by both kinds of stimuli, with binaural beats being the only one eliciting cross-frequency activity. Despite this, we did not find any mood modulation related to our experimental manipulation. Our results provide evidence that binaural beats elicit cross frequency connectivity patterns, but weakly entrain the cortex when compared with monaural beat stimuli. Whether binaural beats have an impact on cognitive performance or other mood measurements remains to be seen and can be further investigated within the proposed methodological framework.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.