Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat
Previous research has shown that musical beat perception is a surprisingly complex phenomenon involving widespread neural coordination across higher-order sensory, motor and cognitive areas. However, the question of how low-level auditory processing must necessarily shape these dynamics, and therefo...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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The Royal Society
2020-03-01
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| Series: | Royal Society Open Science |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.191194 |
| _version_ | 1818454879464587264 |
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| author | Vani G. Rajendran Nicol S. Harper Jan W. H. Schnupp |
| author_facet | Vani G. Rajendran Nicol S. Harper Jan W. H. Schnupp |
| author_sort | Vani G. Rajendran |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Previous research has shown that musical beat perception is a surprisingly complex phenomenon involving widespread neural coordination across higher-order sensory, motor and cognitive areas. However, the question of how low-level auditory processing must necessarily shape these dynamics, and therefore perception, is not well understood. Here, we present evidence that the auditory cortical representation of music, even in the absence of motor or top-down activations, already favours the beat that will be perceived. Extracellular firing rates in the rat auditory cortex were recorded in response to 20 musical excerpts diverse in tempo and genre, for which musical beat perception had been characterized by the tapping behaviour of 40 human listeners. We found that firing rates in the rat auditory cortex were on average higher on the beat than off the beat. This ‘neural emphasis’ distinguished the beat that was perceived from other possible interpretations of the beat, was predictive of the degree of tapping consensus across human listeners, and was accounted for by a spectrotemporal receptive field model. These findings strongly suggest that the ‘bottom-up’ processing of music performed by the auditory system predisposes the timing and clarity of the perceived musical beat. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-14T22:01:54Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-94f407d63bbe4d4581d3b0139e21c148 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2054-5703 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-14T22:01:54Z |
| publishDate | 2020-03-01 |
| publisher | The Royal Society |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Royal Society Open Science |
| spelling | doaj.art-94f407d63bbe4d4581d3b0139e21c1482022-12-21T22:45:58ZengThe Royal SocietyRoyal Society Open Science2054-57032020-03-017310.1098/rsos.191194191194Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beatVani G. RajendranNicol S. HarperJan W. H. SchnuppPrevious research has shown that musical beat perception is a surprisingly complex phenomenon involving widespread neural coordination across higher-order sensory, motor and cognitive areas. However, the question of how low-level auditory processing must necessarily shape these dynamics, and therefore perception, is not well understood. Here, we present evidence that the auditory cortical representation of music, even in the absence of motor or top-down activations, already favours the beat that will be perceived. Extracellular firing rates in the rat auditory cortex were recorded in response to 20 musical excerpts diverse in tempo and genre, for which musical beat perception had been characterized by the tapping behaviour of 40 human listeners. We found that firing rates in the rat auditory cortex were on average higher on the beat than off the beat. This ‘neural emphasis’ distinguished the beat that was perceived from other possible interpretations of the beat, was predictive of the degree of tapping consensus across human listeners, and was accounted for by a spectrotemporal receptive field model. These findings strongly suggest that the ‘bottom-up’ processing of music performed by the auditory system predisposes the timing and clarity of the perceived musical beat.https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.191194beat perceptionauditory cortexrhythmelectrophysiologyentrainmenttemporal processing |
| spellingShingle | Vani G. Rajendran Nicol S. Harper Jan W. H. Schnupp Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat Royal Society Open Science beat perception auditory cortex rhythm electrophysiology entrainment temporal processing |
| title | Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| title_full | Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| title_fullStr | Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| title_full_unstemmed | Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| title_short | Auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| title_sort | auditory cortical representation of music favours the perceived beat |
| topic | beat perception auditory cortex rhythm electrophysiology entrainment temporal processing |
| url | https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.191194 |
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