Familiar music facilitates memory retrieval in adults with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia. This raises the possibility that music can be used as a rehabilitative tool to aid memory abilities more generally. However, the mechanisms behind this effect, and its generality, are unclear because of a lack of parallel work in healthy aging. In particular, exposure to familiar music enhances spontaneous recall of memories directly cued by the music, but it is unknown whether such effects extend to deliberate recall more generally — e.g., to memories not directly linked to the music being played. It is also unclear whether familiar music cues boost recall of specific episodes versus more generalized semantic memories, or whether its effects are partly driven by domain-general mechanisms (e.g., improved mood). In the current study, we will examine the effects of familiar music on deliberate recall and differentiate potential underlying mechanisms. We will expose healthy adults ages 65-80 years old (N = 75) to familiar music clips from earlier in life, unfamiliar music clips, and non-musical audio clips across three study sessions. Immediately after each clip, we will assess free recall of remote memories for pre-selected events. Those memories will then be scored for episodic and semantic details using the Autobiographical Interview. We hypothesize that familiar music may enhance recall of specific events, such that participants will recall more episodic details after exposure to familiar music than unfamiliar music or non-musical audio. We will also test a competing hypothesis that familiar music may prompt more general recollections of periods of life, and thus will increase recall of semantic details in comparison with the unfamiliar music and no-music conditions. The results of this study will advance knowledge of the mechanisms by which music affects memory, with potential implications for the use of music as a therapeutic device for declining memory.

Prediction learning is considered a fundamental feature of biological systems that underlies perception, action, and reward. For cultural artifacts like music, isolating the genesis of reward from prediction is challenging, since predictions are acquired implicitly throughout life. Here, we examined the trajectory of listeners' preferences for melodies in a novel musical scale, where local and global predictions were independently manipulated. Across seven studies (n = 842 total) in two cultures, participants preferred melodies that were presented more during exposure (globally predictable) and that followed schematic expectations (locally predictable). Learning trajectories depended on music reward sensitivity. Furthermore, fMRI showed that while auditory cortical activation reflects predictions, functional connectivity between auditory and reward areas encodes preference. The results are the first to show a hierarchical, relatively culturally-independent process by which predictions map onto reward. Collectively, our findings propose a novel mechanism by which the human brain links predictions with reward value.

Pleasure in music has been linked to predictive coding of melodic and rhythmic patterns, subserved by connectivity between regions in the brain’s auditory and reward networks. Specific musical anhedonics derive little pleasure from music and have altered auditory-reward connectivity, but normal music perception abilities and no generalized physical anhedonia. Recent research suggests that specific musical anhedonics experience normal pleasure in nonmusical sounds, suggesting that the implicated brain pathways may be specific to music reward. However, this work used sounds with clear real-world sources (e.g., babies laughing, crowds cheering), so positive hedonic responses could be based on the referents of these sounds rather than the sounds themselves. We presented specific musical anhedonics and matched controls with isolated short pleasing and displeasing synthesized sounds of varying timbres with no clear real-world referents. While the two groups found displeasing sounds equally displeasing, the musical anhedonics gave substantially lower pleasure ratings to the pleasing sounds, indicating that their sonic anhedonia is not limited to musical rhythms and melodies. Furthermore, across a large sample of participants, mean pleasure ratings for pleasing synthesized sounds predicted significant and similar variance is six dimensions of musical reward which are considered to be relatively independent, suggesting that pleasure in sonic timbres may play a foundational role in the development of reward-related responses to music. We replicate the earlier findings of preserved pleasure ratings for semantically referential sounds in musical anhedonics and find that pleasure ratings of semantic referents, when presented without sounds, correlated with ratings for the sounds themselves. This association was stronger in musical anhedonics compared to controls, suggesting the use of semantic knowledge as a compensatory mechanism for affective sound processing. Our results indicate that specific musical anhedonia is not entirely specific to melodic and rhythmic processing, and that timbre merits further research as a source of pleasure in music.

Home musical environments impact the development of complex abilities. While longitudinal studies on the effect of home musical environments on lifelong outcomes may be resource-intensive, retrospective reports are a relatively quick and inexpensive way to collect data. We present the Music@Home – Retrospective scale, derived partly from the Music@Home – Preschool scale (Politimou et al., 2018) to retrospectively assess the childhood home musical environment. In two studies (total n = 542), we conducted an exploratory factor analysis (Study 1) and confirmatory factor analysis (Study 2) on items adapted from the Music@Home – Preschool scale, revealing a five-factor solution. Along with correlations with musical training, items that were retained for three factors (Caregiver Beliefs, Caregiver Initiation of Singing, Child Engagement with Music) loaded identically to three in the original Music@Home Scale, suggesting construct validity. We also established construct validity for two novel factors: the Attitude towards Childhood Home Musical Environment factor significantly negatively correlated with measures of childhood adversity, and the Social Listening Contexts factor was significantly positively correlated with music-related social reward. Overall, the Music@Home-Retrospective scale enables future investigations of two previously undefined aspects of the home musical environment and offers an entry point into long-term effects of early music engagement on cognitive health and socioemotional well-being.

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