Mari Tervaniemi

University of Helsinki | HY

Over the past decades, the focus of brain research has expanded from using strictly controlled stimuli towards understanding brain functioning in complex naturalistic contexts. Interest has increased in measuring brain processes in natural interaction, including classrooms, theatres, concerts and museums to understand the brain functions in the rea...

Music and language share similar sound features and cognitive processes, which may lead to bidirectional transfer effects of training in one domain on the processing in the other domain. We investigated the impact of native language on musical working memory by comparing nontonal language (Finnish) speakers and tonal language (Chinese) speakers. Fo...

Studies implementing a multimethod perspective in evaluating the acoustics of early childhood education and care (ECEC) spaces both quantitatively and qualitatively are still scarce. In this study the acoustic environments (noise levels and reverberation times) of seven Finnish ECEC group’s premises were examined in association with personnel’s ( N...

A randomized controlled parallel-group trial was conducted to investigate the effectiveness of two 10-week early childhood education and care (ECEC) interventions “SAGA” and “Pikkuli” for supporting social-emotional and verbal development. All children above the age of 4 were invited from 15 Finnish volunteer ECEC groups (n SAGA = 52, n Pikkuli = 5...

Studies in the neuroscience of music gained momentum in the 1990s as an integrated part of the well-controlled experimental research tradition. However, during the past two decades, these studies have moved toward more naturalistic, ecologically valid paradigms. Here, I introduce this move in three frameworks: (i) sound stimulation and empirical pa...

Musically trained individuals have been found to outperform untrained peers in various tasks for executive functions. Here, we present longitudinal behavioral results and cross-sectional, event-related potential (ERP), and fMRI results on the maturation of executive functions in musically trained and untrained children and adolescents. The results...

Previous studies have evidenced how the local prediction of physical stimulus features may affect the neural processing of incoming stimuli. Less known are the effects of cognitive priors on predictive processes, and how the brain computes local versus cognitive predictions and their errors. Here, we determined the differential brain mechanisms und...

Background The P3a response is thought to reflect involuntary orienting to an unexpected stimulus and has been connected with set-shifting and inhibition in some studies. In our exploratory study, we investigated if the amplitude and the latency of the P3a response were associated with the performance in a modified flanker task measuring inhibition...

Background Data attrition has been a common problem in longitudinal lifestyle interventions. The contributors to attrition in technology-supported physical activity interventions have not been thoroughly studied. Objective The present study examined the roles of personality characteristics and indicators of psychological well-being in data attriti...

Mismatch negativity (MMN) studies were initiated as part of a well-controlled experimental research tradition with the aim to identify some key principles of auditory processing and memory. During the past two decades, empirical paradigms have moved toward more ecologically valid ones while retaining rigid experimental control. In this paper, I wil...

Empirical research of community‐based music interventions has advanced to investigate the individual, social, and educational implications of arts‐for‐wellbeing practices. Here, we present the motivations, aims, hypotheses, and implications of this complex field of inquiry. We describe examples of recent large‐scale investigations to reflect on the...

Inter-brain synchronization during social interaction has been linked with several positive phenomena, including closeness, cooperation, prosociality, and team performance. However, the temporal dynamics of inter-brain synchronization during collaboration are not yet fully understood. Furthermore, with collaboration increasingly happening online, t...

Aging is accompanied by difficulties in auditory information processing, especially in more complex sound environments. Choir singing requires efficient processing of multiple sound features and could, therefore, mitigate the detrimental effects of aging on complex auditory encoding. We recorded auditory event‐related potentials during passive list...

Body consciousness is associated with kinetic skills and various aspects of wellbeing. Physical activities have been shown to contribute to the development of body consciousness. Methodological studies are needed in improving the assessment of body consciousness in adults with distinct physical activity backgrounds. This study (1) examined whether...

Previous studies have evidenced how the local prediction of physical stimulus features may affect the neural processing of incoming stimuli. Less known are the effects of cognitive priors on predictive processes, and how the brain computes local versus cognitive predictions and their errors. Here, we determined the differential brain mechanisms und...

Musical activities have been suggested to be beneficial for language development in childhood. Randomised controlled trials using music have indicated that musical interventions can be used to support language skills in children with developmental language difficulties. However, it is not entirely clear how beneficial music activities are for norma...

Music expertise is known to be beneficial for cognitive function and development. In this study, we conducted 1-year music training for school children (n = 123; 7–11 years of age before training) in China. The children were assigned to music or second-language after-class training groups. A passive control group was included. We aimed to investiga...

There are only a few previous EEG studies that were conducted while the audience is listening to live music. However, in laboratory settings using music recordings, EEG frequency bands theta and alpha are connected to music improvisation and creativity. Here, we measured EEG of the audience in a concert-like setting outside the laboratory and compa...

Recent empirical evidence suggests that attending individual instrumental training in music schools benefits the development of cognitive skills such as language and executive functions. In this article, we examine studies that have found these transfer effects provided by group-based music education in school and preschool contexts. We conclude th...

The present study investigated the role of music education in early childhood education and care (ECEC) in relation to the daily activities of children ages one to three, i.e. toddlers (N = 918) in Finnish ECEC units (N = 327). A total of 23,142 random observations were conducted. The observations focused on children’s involvement, emotional expres...

In adults, music and speech share many neurocognitive functions, but how do they interact in a developing brain? We compared the effects of music and foreign language training on auditory neurocognition in Chinese children aged 8–11 years. We delivered group-based training programs in music and foreign language using a randomized controlled trial....

We compared music emotion ratings and their physiological correlates when the participants listened to music at home and in the laboratory. We hypothesized that music emotions are stronger in a familiar environment, that is, at home. Participants listened to their self-selected favorite and neutral music excerpts at home and in the laboratory for 1...

Previous work suggests that musical training in childhood is associated with enhanced executive functions. However, it is unknow whether this advantage extends to selective attention-another central aspect of executive control. We recorded a well-established event-related potential (ERP) marker of distraction, the P3a, during an audio-visual task t...

A person's native language background exerts constraints on the brain's automatic responses while learning a second language. It remains unclear, however, whether and how musical experience may help the brain overcome such constraints and meet the requirements of a second language. This study compared native Chinese English learners who were musici...

Objective: Previous studies suggest that daily music listening can aid stroke recovery, but little is known about the stimulus-dependent and neural mechanisms driving this effect. Building on neuroimaging evidence that vocal music engages extensive and bilateral networks in the brain, we sought to determine if it would be more effective for enhanci...

Consonance and dissonance are basic phenomena in the perception of chords that can be discriminated very early in sensory processing. Musical expertise has been shown to facilitate neural processing of various musical stimuli, but it is unclear whether this applies to detecting consonance and dissonance. Our study aimed to determine if sensitivity...

The COVID-19 disease and the systemic responses to it has impacted lives, routines and procedures at an unprecedented level. While medical care and emergency response present immediate needs, the implications of this pandemic will likely be far-reaching. Most practices that the clinical research within neuroscience and music field rely on, take pla...

In the current longitudinal study, we investigated the development of working memory in musically trained and nontrained children and adolescents, aged 9–20. We measured working memory with the Digit Span (DS) forwards and backwards tests (N = 106) and the Trail-Making A and B (TMT-A and B; N = 104) tests three times, in 2011, 2013, and 2016. We ex...

Qigong is a Meditative Movement exercise that consists of mindful movements, regulation of breathing and attentional control. In this study we investigated whether Qigong practice might be associated with the affect and flow of its practitioners during the exercise. Although practitioners of Meditative Movement anecdotally describe flow-like experi...

While the use of musical parameters for emotional expression has been extensively studied, little is known about which specific musical parameters children at different ages are able to use for expressing specific emotions. We used a novel interface called Music Box that allows modification of musical parameters while music is being played in real...

The aim of this longitudinal intervention study was to examine the impacts of added music, movement, and music-and-movement interventions on children`s (N=73) academic and cognitive skills in context of Finnish primary education during 3rd and 4th grades. The approach of study is inclusive, it is conducted in classroom context with children having...

One important goal of education is to prepare the students with relevant academic competencies and to support their more general well-being and motivation to learn. In this chapter, we will review studies focusing on mathematical skills learning, and the role various cognitive and motivational factors play, especially in the context of Chinese and...

The influence of musical experience on brain development has been mostly studied in school-aged children with formal musical training while little is known about the possible effects of less formal musical activities typical for preschool-aged children (e.g., before the age of seven). In the current study, we investigated whether the amount of musi...

Sung melody provides a mnemonic cue that can enhance the acquisition of novel verbal material in healthy subjects. Recent evidence suggests that also stroke patients, especially those with mild aphasia, can learn and recall novel narrative stories better when they are presented in sung than spoken format. Extending this finding, the present study e...

Musical training in childhood has been linked to enhanced sound encoding at different stages of the auditory processing. In the current study, we used auditory event-related potentials to investigate cortical sound processing in 9- to 15-year-old children (N = 88) with and without musical training. Specifically, we recorded the mismatch negativity...

Learning, attention and action play a crucial role in determining how stimulus predictions are formed, stored, and updated. Years-long experience with the specific repertoires of sounds of one or more musical styles is what characterizes professional musicians. Here we contrasted active experience with sounds, namely long-lasting motor practice, th...

Correlation plots. Correlations between MMN amplitudes to slide and preference for jazz music in non-musicians and amateurs (NM + AM). (TIF)

Group performance on musicality tests and correlation with MMN. (DOCX)

The maturation of 5–6-year-old children’s auditory discrimination – indicated by the development of the auditory event-related-potentials (ERPs) – has not been previously studied in longitudinal settings. For the first time, we present here the results based on extensive dataset collected from 75 children. We followed the 5- to 6-year-olds for 20 m...

Learning in school is intended to help students master academic skills such as reading, writing, and mathematics, as well as to acquire knowledge about different subjects such as history, geography, biology, and so on. However, in the future, successful learning will be largely manifested by students' global and transferable skills, such as analyti...

Several studies have suggested that intensive musical training enhances children’s linguistic skills. Such training, however, is not available to all children. We studied in a community setting whether a low-cost, weekly music playschool provided to 5–6-year-old children in kindergartens could already affect their linguistic abilities. Children (N=...

Noise sensitivity (NS) is currently well described but its etiology has not been sufficiently explained. Noise sensitive individuals are more likely to attend to sound and evaluate it negatively, perceive it as annoying, have stronger emotional reactions to sound and, greater difficulty habituating to sounds. NS describes a vulnerability to negativ...

Music‐based amelioration and training of the developing auditory system has a long tradition, and recent neuroscientific evidence supports using music in this manner. Here, we present the available evidence showing that various music‐related activities result in positive changes in brain structure and function, becoming helpful for auditory cogniti...

Expertise in music has been investigated for decades and the results have been applied not only in composition, performance and music education, but also in understanding brain plasticity in a larger context. Several studies have revealed a strong connection between auditory and motor processes and listening to and performing music, and music imagi...

Coupling novel verbal material with a musical melody can potentially aid in its learning and recall in healthy subjects, but this has never been systematically studied in stroke patients with cognitive deficits. In a counterbalanced design, we presented novel verbal material (short narrative stories) in both spoken and sung formats to stroke patien...

Both musical training and native language have been shown to have experience-based plastic effects on auditory processing. However, the combined effects within individuals are unclear. Recent research suggests that musical training and tone language speaking are not clearly additive in their effects on processing of auditory features and that there...

Data values. Data values for each participant used in statistical analyses and demographic information. (XLSX)

To process complex stimuli like language, our auditory system must tolerate large acoustic variance, like speaker variability, and still be sensitive enough to discriminate between phonemes and to detect complex sound relationships in, e.g., prosodic cues. Our study determined discrimination of speech sounds in input mimicking natural speech variab...

Guitar distortion used in rock music modifies a chord so that new frequencies appear in its harmonic structure. A distorted dyad (power chord) has a special role in heavy metal music due to its harmonics that create a major third interval, making it similar to a major chord. We investigated how distortion affects cortical auditory processing of cho...

Recent functional studies suggest that noise sensitivity, a trait describing attitudes towards noise and predicting noise annoyance, is associated with altered processing in the central auditory system. In the present work, we examined whether noise sensitivity could be related to the structural anatomy of auditory and limbic brain areas. Anatomica...

During past decades, our knowledge about the brain functions and structures underlying music perception, performance, and emotions has accumulated relatively quickly. However, much less is known about the brain determinants underlying music learning and music rehabilitation. In my contribution, I will briefly illuminate the effects of music learnin...

Noise sensitivity (NS) is a common trait. We are still lacking a model for the mechanism of NS. Some studies have suggested psychological origins but there are recent studies addressing the neural mechanism of NS. In our study investigating neuronal sound processing in relation to NS with combined electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalogr...

During the past ten years, an increasing number of controlled studies have assessed the potential rehabilitative effects of music-based interventions, such as music listening, singing, or playing an instrument, in several neurological diseases. Although the number of studies and extent of available evidence is greatest in stroke and dementia, there...

Phonological awareness (PA), the core contributor in phoneme processing abilities, has a link to later reading skills in children. However, the associations between PA and neural auditory discrimination are not clear. We used event-related potential (ERP) methodology and neuropsychological testing to monitor the neurocognitive basis of phonological...

Musical experiences and native language are both known to affect auditory processing. The present work aims to disentangle the influences of native language phonology and musicality on behavioral and subcortical sound feature processing in a population of musically diverse Finnish speakers as well as to investigate the specificity of enhancement fr...

MAJOR-MINOR AND CONSONANCE-DISSONANCE ARE two profound elements of Western tonal music, and have strong affective connotations forWestern listeners. This review summarizes recent evidence on the neurocognitive basis of major-minor and consonancedissonance by presenting studies on their processing and how it is affected by maturation, musical encult...

Noise sensitive individuals are more likely to experience negative emotions from unwanted sounds and they show greater susceptibility to adverse effects of noise on health. Noise sensitivity does not originate from dysfunctions of the peripheral auditory system, and it is thus far unknown whether and how it relates to abnormalities of auditory proc...

The neural responses to simple tones and short sound sequences have been studied extensively. However, in reality the sounds surrounding us are spectrally and temporally complex, dynamic and overlapping. Thus, research using natural sounds is crucial in understanding the operation of the brain in its natural environment. Music is an excellent examp...

Statistical learning and the social contexts of language addressed to infants are hypothesized to play important roles in early language development. Previous behavioral work has found that the exaggerated prosodic contours of infant-directed speech (IDS) facilitate statistical learning in 8-month-old infants. Here we examined the neural processes...

ERPs averaged cumulatively over the 10 blocks of exposure. Mean amplitudes (in microvolts) for the cumulative responses across the 10 exposure blocks for the ADS (left panel) and IDS (right panel) registers over the left and right parietal electrode sites. Grey bars denote significance differences between syllable positions (p < 0.05). (TIF)