Pauline Cantou will defend her thesis titled "Self-regulation and musical training: Neural evidence from early adolescents and adults" Wednesday 8 July at 16.30.

03.07.2020 | Hella Kastbjerg

Leaving childhood to enter adolescence is a significant milestone in life. This crucial step is associated with many emotional, social and cognitive challenges that early adolescents attempt to overcome by developing their own strategies. This process can be influenced by various factors such as the quality of school, familial climates and personality traits that play a determinant role in the positive or negative behavioral outcomes. This critical period is also accompanied with a major reorganization of cognitive and emotional brain systems leading to temporary “out of balance” self-regulation skills. In consideration of these elements, out-of-school activities have been proposed to be possible mediators facilitating brain maturation and behavioral development during this tumultuous time. Notably, musical training has been shown to positively impact children’s inhibitory control, a key component of self-regulation, although the neural mechanisms underlying this transfer remains unclear and poorly studied. Furthermore, most studies focused on young children, and little is known about these effects on the delicate period when children enter adolescence despite the established need to find self-regulation supports in this population.

In this PhD project, neuroimaging and behavioral measures were combined to explore whether musical training impacts self-regulation development and reshapes the brain of early adolescents. The results contribute to a better understanding of the early adolescents’ brain maturation and its modulation by musical training.

The defence is public and will be conducted online by using the Zoom platform (https://aarhusuniversity.zoom.us/j/69699199495)

The title of the project is "Self-regulation and musical training: Neural evidence from early adolescents and adults"

For more information, please contact PhD student Pauline Cantou, email: pauline.cantou@clin.au.dk.

Assessment committee:

Associate professor Christine Parsons (committee chairman)
Interacting Minds Center, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Denmark

Assistant Professor Assal Habibi
The Brain and Creativity Institute, University of Southern California, USA.

Professor Robert Zatorre
Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Canada