SPM topographic significance maps from the jazz improv study.
D.S. Rosen et al./Drexel University
Brain activity maps showing areas associated with high-creativity performances compared with lower-creativity performances. Each map shows a top view of the head.
Drexel University
If expertise was the primary driver behind the observed effect, then when the team statistically controlled for level of expertise ( particularly when it came to public performance), they should have found little difference in the brain scan data. Instead, there were significant differences in the right-hemisphere brain activity (especially the frontal region) between performances rated highly creative and those that received lower creativity ratings.
In short, experts were rated the highest by the panel even though they were approaching the task of jazz improvisation with the most habitual routines. Rosen attributes this in part to the fact that a novice must go through 55 bars of music on a lead sheet quarter by quarter, for instance, whereas an expert will be able to find patterns, like a two-five-one progression. “That allows them to approach the test with a reduced level of that cognitive control,” he said. So creativity is associated with the right hemisphere when we’re dealing with an unfamiliar situation and associated with the left hemisphere when we are highly experienced with the task at hand.
“If creativity is defined in terms of the quality of a product , such as a song, invention, poem, or painting, then the left hemisphere plays a key role, ” said Rosen’s co-author, John Kounios , director of Drexel’s applied and cognitive brain sciences program. “However, if creativity is understood as a person’s ability to deal with novel, unfamiliar situations, as is the case for novice improvisers, then the right hemisphere plays the leading role. “ A dual process )
This experiment will feed into a growing body of research at Rosen’s new music technology startup venture, Secret Chord Laboratories , which develops software to predict the response listeners will have to a given piece of music. The company is Currently targeting the recording industry, which is always looking for the next hit single. (Rosen describes its mission as “an interdisciplinary exploration of the neuroscience of music.”)
The core technology grew out of an earlier study
Rosen did with Georgetown University’s Scott Miles on music perception examining what, if any, patterns of sound produce a pleasure response in the brain. They looked at Hot songs on the Billboard charts, from “Johnny B. Goode” in (through Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” in . “We analyzed every single chord of every one of those songs, and we did a statistical test to see if those charting in the top quartile had a different level of what we call ‘familiar surprise,’ in terms of the harmonic structure,” said Rosen.
They found that the most popular songs had a high level of harmonic surprise, defined as points where the music deviates from listener expectations — the use of relatively rare chords in verses, for example, instead of just sticking with, say, the standard C-major chord progression (C, G, F). The best songs follow up that harmonic surprise with a catchy common chorus. The resulting patents — since expanded to include rhythm, melody, timbre, and lyrics, as well as harmonies — led to the formation of the company.
Rosen and his colleagues next plan to analyze the jazz guitarist data to examine the neural correlates of so-called ” flow states. ” He also thinks it might be possible to design an experiment to test his hypothesis that jazz musicians engage in a form of “switching,” amassing various tricks and techniques they can use if they become momentarily at a loss during an improvisational performance. “Once we can have people back in the labs again, we could throw in really weird chords, or have music that doesn’t match the lead sheet, to see how quickly they respond to being thrown off,” he said.
“My hypothesis is that [experts] would be able to revert back to the brain state they were in before more quickly than a novice would be able to, “said Rosen. “The dual process is not just that novices use all control and executive functioning and that experts use none. It’s about the interaction of those systems, and which ones are predominant in the different levels of expertise.”
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