Why Does Music Therapy Help in Autism?
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Date
2009-01
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Empirical Musicology Review
Abstract
Music therapy is shown to be an effective intervention for emotional
recognition deficits in autism. However, researchers to date have yet to propose a
model that accounts for the neurobiological and cognitive components that are
responsible for such improvements. The current paper outlines a model whereby
the encoding of tonal pitch is proposed as the underlying mechanism. Accurate
tonal pitch perception is important for recognizing emotions like happiness and
sadness in the auditory domain. Once acquired, the ability to perceive tonal pitch
functions as a domain-specific module that proves beneficial for music cognition.
There is biological preparedness for the development of such a module and it is
hypothesized to be preserved in autism. The current paper reinforces the need to
build intervention programs based on this preserved module in autism, and
proposes that this module may form the basis for a range of benefits related to
music therapy. Possible brain areas associated with this module are suggested.
Description
Keywords
emotional processing, rehabilitation, music cognition, neurobiology
Citation
Empirical Musicology Review, v4 n1 (January 2009), 11-18