Train the Brain With Music: Brain Plasticity and Cognitive Benefits Induced by Musical Practice in Elderly People (TBM)

School of Health Sciences Geneva

Status

Completed

Conditions

Age-related Cognitive Decline

Treatments

Behavioral: musical practice

Behavioral: music education

Study type

Interventional

Funder types

Other

Identifiers

NCT03674931

81185

Details and patient eligibility

About

This longitudinal study aims to countervail age-related cognitive and cerebral decline in healthy retired people through intensive piano / keyboard music practice in Switzerland and Germany.

Full description

Recent data suggest that music making might prevent cognitive decline in the elderly. However, experimental evidence remains sparse and no information on the neurophysiological basis has been provided, although cognitive decline is a major impediment to healthy aging. This study combines for the first time protocolled music practice in elderly with cutting-edge neuroimaging. The investigators propose a multi-site Hannover-Geneva longitudinal randomized intervention study in altogether 100 retired healthy elderly (64-76) years, 70 Geneva, 100 Hannover), offering either piano instruction or instruction on musical culture for one year. Participants will be tested at 3 time points on cognitive, perceptual and motor abilities as well as via wide-ranging functional and structural neuroimaging data (Magnetic Resonance Imaging, MRI). The research team expects positive transfer effects from intensive piano training not only on subjective well-being, but also on executive functions, working memory, hearing in noise and relationships of these behavioral features with morphological and functional brain plasticity. This study may therefore for the first time be demonstrate, that music making can provoke important societal impacts by diminishing cognitive and perceptual-motor decline underpinned by functional and structural brain plasticity.

Enrollment

150 patients

Sex

All

Ages

64 to 76 years old

Volunteers

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

Healthy right-handed volunteers, between 64 and 76 years of age, native French speakers. No regular musical practice over the lifespan. Only retired individuals may participate.

Exclusion criteria

Impaired/not-corrected auditory or visual accuracy, neurological diseases in the present or the past, cardiovascular diseases, excessive hypertension, obesity, diabetes mellitus, beginning dementia, mild cognitive impairment, clinical depression.