ArticleThe Behavioral and brain sciences2020
Origins of music in credible signaling.
Article in The Behavioral and brain sciences, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 75 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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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.
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Who cites it
75 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 253 citations in OpenAlex.
- Language experience predicts music processing in a half-million speakers of fifty-four languages.Current biology : CB · 2023Pooled it
- The influence of maternal singing on well-being, postpartum depression and bonding - a randomised, controlled trial.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2021Trial
- Musical improvisation enhances interpersonal coordination in subsequent conversation: Motor and speech evidence.PloS one · 2021Trial
- Shared music listening, emotional arousal and cognitive empathy enhance social presence in online interactions.Cognitive processing · 2026Article
- Expressing emotions through music.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2026Review
- Critical Review on the Development and Evolution of Beat Perception.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2026Review
- GWAS of Active Music Engagement Frequency in the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging.Research square · 2026Article
- A chill brain-music interface for enhancing music chills with personalized playlists.iScience · 2026Article
- Movement synchrony and familiarity in dyadic and four-person conversations.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Three evolutionary functions of human music: predator defense, obtaining food, preparation for war.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Core systems of music perception.Trends in cognitive sciences · 2025Review
- The role of musical pitch in long-distance defensive signaling.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2025Review
- Pleasurable music activates cerebral µ-opioid receptors: a combined PET-fMRI study.European journal of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging · 2025Article
- The cultural evolution of distortion in music (and other norms of mixed appeal).Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Article
- The shared genetic architecture and evolution of human language and musical rhythm.Nature human behaviour · 2025Article
- Acoustic features of instrumental movie soundtracks elicit distinct and mostly non-overlapping extra-musical meanings in the mind of the listener.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Music as a social instrument: a brief historical and conceptual perspective.Frontiers in cognition · 2025Review
- The Expanded Natural History of Song Discography, A Global Corpus of Vocal Music.Open mind : discoveries in cognitive science · 2025Article
- Work together, move together-Cooperation and rapport promote interpersonal synchrony.PloS one · 2025Article
- On joy and sorrow: Neuroimaging meta-analyses of music-induced emotion.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2025Article
15 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
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Abstract
Music comprises a diverse category of cognitive phenomena that likely represent both the effects of psychological adaptations that are specific to music (e.g., rhythmic entrainment) and the effects of adaptations for non-musical functions (e.g., auditory scene analysis). How did music evolve? Here, we show that prevailing views on the evolution of music - that music is a byproduct of other evolved faculties, evolved for social bonding, or evolved to signal mate quality - are incomplete or wrong. We argue instead that music evolved as a credible signal in at least two contexts: coalitional interactions and infant care. Specifically, we propose that (1) the production and reception of coordinated, entrained rhythmic displays is a co-evolved system for credibly signaling coalition strength, size, and coordination ability; and (2) the production and reception of infant-directed song is a co-evolved system for credibly signaling parental attention to secondarily altricial infants. These proposals, supported by interdisciplinary evidence, suggest that basic features of music, such as melody and rhythm, result from adaptations in the proper domain of human music. The adaptations provide a foundation for the cultural evolution of music in its actual domain, yielding the diversity of musical forms and musical behaviors found worldwide.
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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.