Can very early music interventions promote at-risk infants’ development?

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

Abstract

Music and musical activities are often a natural part of parenting. As accumulating evidence shows, music can promote auditory and language development in infancy and early childhood. It may even help to support auditory and language skills in infants whose development is compromised by heritable conditions, like the reading deficit dyslexia, or by environmental factors, such as premature birth. For example, infants born to dyslexic parents can have atypical brain responses to speech sounds and subsequent challenges in language development. Children born very preterm, in turn, have an increased likelihood of sensory, cognitive, and motor deficits. To ameliorate these deficits, we have developed early interventions focusing on music. Preliminary results of our ongoing longitudinal studies suggest that music making and parental singing promote infants' early language development and auditory neural processing. Together with previous findings in the field, the present studies highlight the role of active, social music making in supporting auditory and language development in at-risk children and infants. Once completed, the studies will illuminate both risk and protective factors in development and offer a comprehensive model of understanding the promises of music activities in promoting positive developmental outcomes during the first years of life.

Original languageEnglish
JournalAnnals of the New York Academy of Sciences
Volume1423
Issue number1
Pages (from-to)92-101
Number of pages10
ISSN0077-8923
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jul 2018
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Fields of Science

  • 3141 Health care science
  • 515 Psychology
  • music interventions
  • infancy
  • EEG/MEG
  • dyslexia
  • prematurity
  • EVENT-RELATED POTENTIALS
  • AUDITORY-DISCRIMINATION
  • PRETERM INFANTS
  • LANGUAGE-DEVELOPMENT
  • 4-MONTH-OLD INFANTS
  • PREMATURE-INFANTS
  • BRAIN PLASTICITY
  • CHILDREN
  • SPEECH
  • EXPERIENCE

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