Stefan Koelsch

University of Bergen

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Angela D. Friederici

Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences

Sebastian Jentschke

University of Bergen

Daniela Sammler

Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences

Thomas Hans Fritz

Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences

Stavros Skouras

University of Bergen

Thomas C. Gunter

Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences

Günter Gebauer

Freie Universität Berlin

Nikolaus Steinbeis

University College London

Christian von Scheve

Freie Universität Berlin

Manfred Holodynski

University of Münster

Cooperative Institutions

Acoustical Society of America

208

Scripps Institution of Oceanography

195

Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences

Max Planck Society

Google (United States)

Freie Universität Berlin

Leipzig University

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

University of Bergen

Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin

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The emotional power of poetry: neural circuitry, psychophysiology and compositional principles

Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (2017)

Eugen Wassiliwizky Stefan Koelsch Valentin Wagner Thomas Jacobsen Winfried Menninghaus

It is a common experience-and well established experimentally-that music can engage us emotionally in a compelling manner. The mechanisms underlying these experiences are receiving increasing scrutiny. However, the extent to which other domains of aesthetic experience can similarly elicit strong emotions is unknown. Using psychophysiology, neuroimaging and behavioral responses, we show that recited poetry can act as a powerful stimulus for eliciting peak emotional responses, including chills and objectively measurable goosebumps that engage the primary reward circuitry. Importantly, while these responses to poetry are largely analogous to those found for music, their neural underpinnings show important differences, specifically with regard to the crucial role of the nucleus accumbens. We also go beyond replicating previous music-related studies by showing that peak aesthetic pleasure can co-occur with physiological markers of negative affect. Finally, the distribution of chills across the trajectory of poems provides insight into compositional principles of poetry.

Psychophysiology

Stimulus (psychology)

Auditory imagery

Curiosity

10.1093/scan/nsx069

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Citations (204)

The Temporal Pole Top-Down Modulates the Ventral Visual Stream During Social Cognition

Cerebral Cortex (2015)

Corinna Pehrs Jamil Zaki Lorna H. Schlochtermeier Arthur M. Jacobs Lars Kuchinke

The temporal pole (TP) has been associated with diverse functions of social cognition and emotion processing. Although the underlying mechanism remains elusive, one possibility is that TP acts as domain-general hub integrating socioemotional information. To test this, 26 participants were presented with 60 empathy-evoking film clips during fMRI scanning. The film clips were preceded by a linguistic sad or neutral context and half of the clips were accompanied by sad music. In line with its hypothesized role, TP was involved in the processing of sad context and furthermore tracked participants' empathic concern. To examine the neuromodulatory impact of TP, we applied nonlinear dynamic causal modeling to a multisensory integration network from previous work consisting of superior temporal gyrus (STG), fusiform gyrus (FG), and amygdala, which was extended by an additional node in the TP. Bayesian model comparison revealed a gating of STG and TP on fusiform-amygdalar coupling and an increase of TP to FG connectivity during the integration of contextual information. Moreover, these backward projections were strengthened by emotional music. The findings indicate that during social cognition, TP integrates information from different modalities and top-down modulates lower-level perceptual areas in the ventral visual stream as a function of integration demands.

Fusiform gyrus

Superior temporal sulcus

Multisensory Integration

10.1093/cercor/bhv226

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Citations (81)

Investigating the Relationship of Music and Language in Children

Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (2005)

Sebastian Jentschke Stefan Koelsch Angela D. Friederici

A bstract : Language and music are human universals involving perceptually discrete elements organized in hierarchically structured sequences. The set of principles governing the combination of these structural elements into sequences is known as syntax . A violation of expectancies concerning syntactic regularities may be reflected by two ERP components: the ERAN (early right anterior negativity) and the ELAN (early left anterior negativity). The ERAN is evoked by a violation of musical regularities, whereas the ELAN is linked to syntax processing in the language domain. There is evidence from adult data to suggest that both ERAN and ELAN are, at least partly, generated in the same brain regions. Therefore, it seems plausible to expect transfer effects between music and language due to shared processing resources. Moreover, the ERAN is larger in adults with formal musical training (musicians) than in those without, indicating that more specific representations of musical regularities lead to heightened musical expectancies. The aim of this study is to investigate these issues in child development. We conducted two experimental sessions with the same participants and compared children with and without musical training (11 years old) and children with or without language impairment (5 years old). In a music experiment, the reactions to chord sequences ending either with a (regular) tonic or with an (irregular) supertonic were compared. For a language experiment we used syntactically correct and incorrect sentences. Preliminary results show that an ERAN is present in both groups and appears to have a larger amplitude in musically trained children. In addition, there are indications of an enhanced negativity in response to a syntactic violation in the musically trained children. The relationship between the ERP components is, moreover, manifested in the finding that an ERAN is present in linguistically nonimpaired children at the age of 5 years but not in children with language impairment of the same age.

Chord (peer-to-peer)

10.1196/annals.1360.016

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Citations (74)

Sequential Effects of Increasing Propofol Sedation on Frontal and Temporal Cortices as Indexed by Auditory Event-related Potentials

Anesthesiology (2004)

Wolfgang Heinke Ramona Kenntner Thomas C. Gunter Daniela Sammler D Olthoff

It is an open question whether cognitive processes of auditory perception that are mediated by functionally different cortices exhibit the same sensitivity to sedation. The auditory event-related potentials P1, mismatch negativity (MMN), and early right anterior negativity (ERAN) originate from different cortical areas and reflect different stages of auditory processing. The P1 originates mainly from the primary auditory cortex. The MMN is generated in or in the close vicinity of the primary auditory cortex but is also dependent on frontal sources. The ERAN mainly originates from frontal generators. The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of increasing propofol sedation on different stages of auditory processing as reflected in P1, MMN, and ERAN.The P1, the MMN, and the ERAN were recorded preoperatively in 18 patients during four levels of anesthesia adjusted with target-controlled infusion: awake state (target concentration of propofol 0.0 microg/ml), light sedation (0.5 microg/ml), deep sedation (1.5 microg/ml), and unconsciousness (2.5-3.0 microg/ml). Simultaneously, propofol anesthesia was assessed using the Bispectral Index.Propofol sedation resulted in a progressive decrease in amplitudes and an increase of latencies with a similar pattern for MMN and ERAN. MMN and ERAN were elicited during sedation but were abolished during unconsciousness. In contrast, the amplitude of the P1 was unchanged by sedation but markedly decreased during unconsciousness.The results indicate differential effects of propofol sedation on cognitive functions that involve mainly the auditory cortices and cognitive functions that involve the frontal cortices.

Unconsciousness

10.1097/00000542-200403000-00023

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Citations (93)

Neural correlates of processing structure in music and language - Influences of musical training and language impairment

Sebastian Jentschke Stefan Koelsch Angela D. Friederici

Language impairment

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Is musical engagement enough to keep the brain young?

Research Square (Research Square) (2022)

Anna Maria Matziorinis Christian Gaser Stefan Koelsch

Abstract Music-making and engagement in music-related activities have shown procognitive benefits for healthy and pathological populations, suggesting reductions in brain aging. A previous brain aging study, using Brain Age Gap Estimation (BrainAGE), showed that professional and amateur-musicians had younger appearing brains than non-musicians. Our study sought to replicate those findings and analyze if musical training or active musical engagement was necessary to produce an age decelerating effect in a cohort of healthy individuals. We scanned 125 healthy controls and investigated if musician status, and if musical behaviours, namely Active Musical Engagement (AME) and Musical Training (MT) (as measured using the Goldsmiths Musical Sophistication Index (Gold-MSI)), had effects on brain aging. Our findings suggest that musician status is not related to BrainAGE score, although involvement in current physical activity is. Although neither MT or AME subscales of the Gold-MSI are predictive for BrainAGE scores, dispositional resilience, namely the ability to deal with challenge is related to both musical behaviours and sensitivity to musical pleasure. While the study failed to replicate the previous brain aging study, musical training and active musical engagement are related to the resilience factor of challenge. This finding may reveal how such musical behaviours can potentially strengthen the brain’s resilience to age, possibly revealing a type of neurocognitive reserve.

Neurocognitive

10.21203/rs.3.rs-1991605/v1

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Citations (0)

4. Vom Affekt zur Emotion und von der Emotion zum Wort – Neurobiologische Korrelate

Velbrück Wissenschaft eBooks (2017)

Günter Gebauer Manfred Holodynski Stefan Koelsch Christian von Scheve

Emotionen erscheinen uns wie Objekte, die wir in unserem Inneren erkennen. Tatsächlich aber können wir sie weder direkt beobachten noch benennen, wie wir es bei äußeren Gegenständen gewohnt sind. Wittgenstein hat dies mit seinem berühmten »Privatsprachenargument« gezeigt. Wie ist es dennoch möglich, dass wir über Emotionen sprechen können? Die Wendung, die die vorliegende Untersuchung diesem Problem gibt, besteht darin, die Entwicklung und soziale Formung des Sprechens über Emotionen zu analysieren: Auf welcher biologischen Grundlage entwickeln Menschen diese Fähigkeit? Wie erkennt ein kleines Kind im Sprechenlernen seine Emotionen, sodass es weiß, welche Wörter ihnen entsprechen? Welche sozialen Voraussetzungen müssen für den Erwerb dieser Fähigkeit erfüllt sein und wie werden sie in gesellschaftlichen Prozessen verändert und weiterentwickelt? Diese Fragen werden aus der Perspektive der Philosophie, Psychologie und Entwicklungspsychologie, der Neurobiologie und Soziologie beantwortet. Der Weg führt von der Innensicht (Ich-Perspektive) des Kindes über die empathische Teilhabe seiner Bezugspersonen (Du-Perspektive) zu alltäglichen sozialen Interaktionen, in denen das emotionale Geschehen fortlaufend geformt wird (Er-Perspektive). Die Autoren zeigen dergestalt, wie die zunächst biologisch gegebene Emotion (das Emotionsperzept) in der Sphäre der symbolisch und sprachlich vermittelten Kommunikation re-konfiguriert wird.

10.5771/9783845292472-191

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Neurophysiologie der Musikwahrnehmung bei Kindern

Stefan Koelsch Tobias Großmann

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Author Correction: When the statistical MMN meets the physical MMN

Scientific Reports (2019)

Vera Tsogli Sebastian Jentschke Tatsuya Daikoku Stefan Koelsch

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

10.1038/s41598-019-52009-8

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Citations (2)

Unpredictability of the “when” influences prediction error processing of the “what” and “where”

PLoS ONE (2022)

Vera Tsogli Sebastian Jentschke Stefan Koelsch

The capability to establish accurate predictions is an integral part of learning. Whether predictions about different dimensions of a stimulus interact with each other, and whether such an interaction affects learning, has remained elusive. We conducted a statistical learning study with EEG (electroencephalography), where a stream of consecutive sound triplets was presented with deviants that were either: (a) statistical, depending on the triplet ending probability, (b) physical, due to a change in sound location or (c) double deviants, i.e. a combination of the two. We manipulated the predictability of stimulus-onset by using random stimulus-onset asynchronies. Temporal unpredictability due to random onsets reduced the neurophysiological responses to statistical and location deviants, as indexed by the statistical mismatch negativity (sMMN) and the location MMN. Our results demonstrate that the predictability of one stimulus attribute influences the processing of prediction error signals of other stimulus attributes, and thus also learning of those attributes.

Predictability

Stimulus (psychology)

Statistical Learning

10.1371/journal.pone.0263373

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Citations (10)