Playing Instruments May Help Improve Child's Hearing

Children who play all sorts of instruments early on in their lives have better hearing capabilities, according to a recent study.

Music lessons during childhood helps keep the brain and hearing sharp until later on in life. Researchers involved in the study found that adults who used to play instruments and stopped can still benefit from it later on in their lives. They looked at how quickly a person's brain makes sense of sounds.

Researchers from Northwestern University in Illinois measured brain activity of 44 healthy adults as they listened to the sound 'da'. It was found that the more years people played instruments, the more likely were their cells and neurons developed. Those who had put in at least four years of practice were around a thousand of a second faster compared to those who never learned to play an instrument.

''Being a millisecond faster may not seem like much but the brain is very sensitive to timing and a millisecond compounded over millions of neurons can make a real difference in the lives of older adults", said Michael Kilgard, a brain scientist from Texas University. "These findings confirm that the investments we make in our brains early in life continue to pay dividends years later", he added.

Dr. Nina Kraus, lead author of the study previously showed that pensioners who played an instrument throughout their life are much quicker at picking up all sorts of sounds from various types of sources. Previous studies have also shown that learning how to play an instrument can help boost one's IQ and this can be done regardless of age. "One of the reasons we think that playing music can drive so many changes in the brain is the tight intersection between perpetual, cognition and emotional systems involved in music-making", said Dr. Kraus.