Music and Language are Processed by the Same Brain Systems: Study

Researchers at Georgetown University Medical Centre have found evidence that music and language are processed by the same brain systems.

Language is processed by two brain systems. The system based in the temporal lobes helps humans memorize information such as, words and meanings, while the other based in the frontal lobes helps them unconsciously learn and use the rules that underlies language such as the rules of syntax in sentences.

Now, Robbin Miranda, Ph.D., a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Neuroscience, Michael Ullman, Ph.D., professor of neuroscience, psychology, neurology and linguistics have found that the same systems are used when it comes to processing music.

The system based in the temporal lobes helps to memorize information in music such as familiar melodies, and the one based in the frontal lobes helps learn the rules of music, such as the rules of harmony.

“Up until now, researchers had found that the processing of rules relies on an overlapping set of frontal lobe structures in music and language. However, in addition to rules, both language and music crucially require the memorization of arbitrary information such as words and melodies,” the study’s principal investigator, Dr Ullman.

“This study not only confirms that one set of brain structures underlies rules in both language and music, but also suggests, for the first time, that a different brain system underlies memorized information in both domains. So language and music both depend on two different brain systems, each for the same type of thing – rules in one case, and arbitrary information in the other,” he added.