Psyche Loui: Neural and cognitive mechanisms for music: Insights from special populations

Abstract:

Music is ubiquitous around the world, but the source of musical ability is unknown. How do human beings come to know what they know about music? In this talk, I will review our recent research on the extreme ends of musicality: tone-deafness, absolute pitch, and synesthesia. Behavioral and neuroimaging studies from these special populations can provide unique windows into the neural and cognitive mechanisms that are important for music. By comparing these populations to well-matched controls, we find that structural and functional connectivity in the brain are crucial for fundamental aspects of musical ability such as perception, categorization, learning, and production of musical pitch.

Bio:

Psyche Loui is a neuroscientist, musician, and Instructor in Neurology at the Harvard Medical School, where her research aims to find out why humans make music, and how music can develop and repair the brain. She obtained her BS from Duke University and her PhD from University of California at Berkeley, where her work investigated the human ability to learn new musical systems. She has published in top journals and her work has been featured in the BBC, WGBH, Boston Globe, New York Times, Science Daily, MSNBC, and other news sources. Dr. Loui currently holds grants from the Grammy Foundation, Templeton Foundation, and National Institute of Deafness and Communication Disorders. She presented her work at TEDxCambridge in 2011.