Title: The role of the right and left hemispheres in music perception
Abstract: Early views on cerebral dominance put the functions of music in the left hemisphere. Subsequent empirical investigations reversed the dominance to the right hemisphere, while current research implicates both hemispheres, with most, but not all functions in the right. However, the opposite is true for musicians where most functions are processed in the left hemisphere. The apparent contradiction can be resolved, however, by recognizing that cognitive functions of the right hemisphere are organized for global or wholistic stimuli, conducive to most musical listening. Temporal stimuli or critical analyses (as performed by musicians) reduces or reverses the right hemisphere preference. What emerges is that hemispheric dominance for music, language, or other functions may depend on which hemisphere the subject chooses or learns to activate. For most music, it is the right; but for some musicians and some stimuli it may be the left. Furthermore, recent results imply that hemispheric preference in musicians may differ from subject to subject raising a more interesting question of whether it is the subjects' cognitive profiles that influence the music rather than the other way around.
Publication Year: 1981
Publication Date: 1981-05-01
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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