ArticleFrontiers in aging neuroscience2022
Six Months of Piano Training in Healthy Elderly Stabilizes White Matter Microstructure in the Fornix, Compared to an Active Control Group.
Article in Frontiers in aging neuroscience, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 24 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
24 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Neurobiological effects of music-making interventions for older adults: a systematic review.Aging clinical and experimental research · 2025Pooled it
- Quality of life in older adults is enhanced by piano practice: Results from a randomized controlled trial.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2025Trial
- Cognitive enrichment through art: a randomized controlled trial on the effect of music or visual arts group practice on cognitive and brain development of young children.BMC complementary medicine and therapies · 2024Trial
- Attention and vigilance advantages related to formal musical training across childhood, adolescence and young adulthood.British journal of psychology (London, England : 1953) · 2026Article
- The sound of longevity: music and technology for healthy ageing.Aging clinical and experimental research · 2026Review
- Protocol for an unblinded randomised controlled feasibility trial of Piano Instruction for Adult Novices as Online Cognitive intervention (PIANO-Cog): a novel remote piano training programme for cognitive and motor functions in older age.Pilot and feasibility studies · 2025Article
- Article
- Brain-Inspired Multisensory Learning: A Systematic Review of Neuroplasticity and Cognitive Outcomes in Adult Multicultural and Second Language Acquisition.Biomimetics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Radical Imagination: An Afrofuturism and Creative Aging Program for Black Women's Brain Health and Wellness.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Music training and language learning improve verbal memory performance but do not change white matter characteristics of the splenium: a longitudinal DTI study.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Plasticity of Myelination.Advances in neurobiology · 2025Review
- Age-related neural changes underlying long-term recognition of musical sequences.Communications biology · 2024Article
- Article
- Choir singing is associated with enhanced structural connectivity across the adult lifespan.Human brain mapping · 2024Article
- Sensorimotor Impairment in Aging and Neurocognitive Disorders: Beat Synchronization and Adaptation to Tempo Changes.Journal of Alzheimer's disease : JAD · 2024Article
- The effects of musicality on brain network topology in the context of Alzheimer's disease and memory decline.Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2024Article
- Increased functional connectivity in the right dorsal auditory stream after a full year of piano training in healthy older adults.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Article
- Music interventions in 132 healthy older adults enhance cerebellar grey matter and auditory working memory, despite general brain atrophy.Neuroimage. Reports · 2023Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
While aging is characterized by neurodegeneration, musical training is associated with experience-driven brain plasticity and protection against age-related cognitive decline. However, evidence for the positive effects of musical training mostly comes from cross-sectional studies while randomized controlled trials with larger sample sizes are rare. The current study compares the influence of six months of piano training with music listening/musical culture lessons in 121 musically naïve healthy elderly individuals with regard to white matter properties using fixel-based analysis. Analyses revealed a significant fiber density decline in the music listening/musical culture group (but not in the piano group), after six months, in the fornix, which is a white matter tract that naturally declines with age. In addition, these changes in fiber density positively correlated to episodic memory task performances and the amount of weekly piano training. These findings not only provide further evidence for the involvement of the fornix in episodic memory encoding but also more importantly show that learning to play the piano at an advanced age may stabilize white matter microstructure of the fornix.
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