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> The headline makes it sound like learning music is about as useless as sitting on your couch, as far as intelligence goes. Isn't that kind of what the study

by Farow 6y ago

> The headline makes it sound like learning music is about as useless as sitting on your couch, as far as intelligence goes. Isn't that kind of what the study says though? It specifically concludes: > Moreover, recent correlational studies have confirmed that music engagement is not associated with domain-general cognitive skills or academic performance. What I understand from this study is that whether you learn music or sit on your couch will have no difference on your cognitive abilities and only make you better at music if you do the former. The study also mentions that you can't transfer skills to different domains. I think this further reinforces their conclusion. > While human cognition has been shown to be malleable to training, transfer of skills appears to be limited to the training domain and, at best, other similar domains. [...] Near transfer – i.e., the transfer of skills within the same domain – is sometimes observed, far transfer – i.e., the transfer of skills across two distant domains – is rare or possibly inexistent. While music can have positive effects, those would be mostly limited your general well-being, will not make you smarter and can be achieved through other activities as well. > Music may be beneficial for non-cognitive constructs in children such as prosocial behavior and self-esteem. These possible advantages are not likely to be specific to music, though. In fact, any enticing and empowering activity may improve children’s well-being.

sriku 6y ago
From a neurological perspective, this seems to be at loggerheads with findings that active brain engagement (puzzles, games, music, etc) can help push out alzheimer's and such degenerative diseases. At first read, I felt an urge to conspiracy theorize that the study was sponsored to help direct funding to other areas of schooling instead of increasing funding overall.
andreilys 6y ago
What I understand from this study is that whether you learn music or sit on your couch will have no difference on your cognitive abilities and only make you better at music if you do the former. That's in stark contradiction to: The authors found studies with high-quality design, such as those which used a group of active controls – children who did not learn music but instead learned a different skill, such as dance or sports, for example – showed no effect of music education on cognitive or academic performance. The comparison is to children engaged in some sort of behavior, not passively sitting on the couch consuming tv. Also the whole concept of measuring intelligence in itself is dubious at best. IQ tests in particular are nothing more than measures of how good someone is at taking tests and not a good measure of intelligence.
cycomanic 6y ago
> > The headline makes it sound like learning music is about as useless as sitting on your couch, as far as intelligence goes. > Isn't that kind of what the study says though? It specifically concludes: > > Moreover, recent correlational studies have confirmed that music engagement is not associated with domain-general cognitive skills or academic performance. > What I understand from this study is that whether you learn music or sit on your couch will have no difference on your cognitive abilities and only make you better at music if you do the former. That's actually not quite clear to me, the article says: >The authors found studies with high-quality design, such as those which used a group of active controls – children who did not learn music but instead learned a different skill, such as dance or sports, for example – showed no effect of music education on cognitive or academic performance. That seems to indicate that siting on the couch is not the same. It also changes the title somewhat, to "learning music is not better than dance or sport to improve cognitive skills"
lhorie 6y ago
> Isn't that kind of what the study says though? Perhaps so for specific cognitive measurements, but you quoted yourself a semi-contradictory blurb: > Music may be beneficial for non-cognitive constructs in children such as prosocial behavior and self-esteem. (at least, I'm not aware of any claims of sedentarism being correlated with anything positive) One could argue that some aspects of intelligence do fall in the "nature" realm (as opposed to being nurturable), but for _practical purposes_, one ought to consider the application of said intelligence to real life scenarios, and I think improvements in prosocial behavior and self-esteem can certainly be important factors there.
- charwalker 6y ago
  > Music may be beneficial for non-cognitive constructs in children such as prosocial behavior and self-esteem. Learning music, incuding an instrument to play on, teaches a ton of skills (focus, effortful practice techniques, managing failure and your limits, adapting what you have learned to different but similar music, work with other musicians on duets and more, etc) that you can learn through other mechanisms (athletics, LEGO/FIRST robotics, regular schoolwork). If anything, the ability to encounter a new piece of music (say jazz), connect it to styles or pieces you already understand, then to improvise off the style and make it your own is a process many developers do week to week with reading and adapting old code. You can't master one then immediately excel at the other but the base skills related to patience and effort connect. Anecdotally, I learned a few instruments growing up and although I resented part of the process I think it benefited me a ton. I felt like I had a drop off in focus and effort applied to tasks after I stopped paying after high school. I met and kept a ton of awesome friends through music and playing in school bands. I have a lot of memories and success stories that come from learning an instrument and how music works. That was compelling when learning about physics and sound or how in tune notes are created based on a mathematical equation. It was super helpful to connect with others who learned an instrument growing up, like a few of my friends I see (not anymore) or talk to weekly. So I can be a data point for the prosocial argument as well as self esteem. I think the process helped me get to where I am today, even if I don't play anymore.

by Farow 6y ago

sriku 6y ago

From a neurological perspective, this seems to be at loggerheads with findings that active brain engagement (puzzles, games, music, etc) can help push out alzheimer's and such degenerative diseases. At first read, I felt an urge to conspiracy theorize that the study was sponsored to help direct funding to other areas of schooling instead of increasing funding overall.

andreilys 6y ago

What I understand from this study is that whether you learn music or sit on your couch will have no difference on your cognitive abilities and only make you better at music if you do the former. That's in stark contradiction to: The authors found studies with high-quality design, such as those which used a group of active controls – children who did not learn music but instead learned a different skill, such as dance or sports, for example – showed no effect of music education on cognitive or academic performance. The comparison is to children engaged in some sort of behavior, not passively sitting on the couch consuming tv. Also the whole concept of measuring intelligence in itself is dubious at best. IQ tests in particular are nothing more than measures of how good someone is at taking tests and not a good measure of intelligence.

cycomanic 6y ago

> > The headline makes it sound like learning music is about as useless as sitting on your couch, as far as intelligence goes. > Isn't that kind of what the study says though? It specifically concludes: > > Moreover, recent correlational studies have confirmed that music engagement is not associated with domain-general cognitive skills or academic performance. > What I understand from this study is that whether you learn music or sit on your couch will have no difference on your cognitive abilities and only make you better at music if you do the former. That's actually not quite clear to me, the article says: >The authors found studies with high-quality design, such as those which used a group of active controls – children who did not learn music but instead learned a different skill, such as dance or sports, for example – showed no effect of music education on cognitive or academic performance. That seems to indicate that siting on the couch is not the same. It also changes the title somewhat, to "learning music is not better than dance or sport to improve cognitive skills"

lhorie 6y ago

> Isn't that kind of what the study says though? Perhaps so for specific cognitive measurements, but you quoted yourself a semi-contradictory blurb: > Music may be beneficial for non-cognitive constructs in children such as prosocial behavior and self-esteem. (at least, I'm not aware of any claims of sedentarism being correlated with anything positive) One could argue that some aspects of intelligence do fall in the "nature" realm (as opposed to being nurturable), but for _practical purposes_, one ought to consider the application of said intelligence to real life scenarios, and I think improvements in prosocial behavior and self-esteem can certainly be important factors there.

charwalker 6y ago
> Music may be beneficial for non-cognitive constructs in children such as prosocial behavior and self-esteem. Learning music, incuding an instrument to play on, teaches a ton of skills (focus, effortful practice techniques, managing failure and your limits, adapting what you have learned to different but similar music, work with other musicians on duets and more, etc) that you can learn through other mechanisms (athletics, LEGO/FIRST robotics, regular schoolwork). If anything, the ability to encounter a new piece of music (say jazz), connect it to styles or pieces you already understand, then to improvise off the style and make it your own is a process many developers do week to week with reading and adapting old code. You can't master one then immediately excel at the other but the base skills related to patience and effort connect. Anecdotally, I learned a few instruments growing up and although I resented part of the process I think it benefited me a ton. I felt like I had a drop off in focus and effort applied to tasks after I stopped paying after high school. I met and kept a ton of awesome friends through music and playing in school bands. I have a lot of memories and success stories that come from learning an instrument and how music works. That was compelling when learning about physics and sound or how in tune notes are created based on a mathematical equation. It was super helpful to connect with others who learned an instrument growing up, like a few of my friends I see (not anymore) or talk to weekly. So I can be a data point for the prosocial argument as well as self esteem. I think the process helped me get to where I am today, even if I don't play anymore.