Subject: Re: 'Speak in my right ear and sing in my left' From: Martin Braun <nombraun(at)TELIA.COM> Date: Tue, 28 Sep 2004 21:14:08 +0200Barbara Reynolds wrote: > Since there may be a definite processing lateralization of the brain at birth (or prenatally), it is not a big stretch to think that the brain would exert more control over the contralateral ear than an equal effect on both. It had previously been established that the final link of this descending innervation is functional at birth. But there had been no evidence that the full top-down pathway, from cortex to the inner ear, was functional at birth. The new results in the Science article now indicate that this may in fact, at least partly, be the case. However, the effect that was now reported was very weak. Only 53.6 % of the infants showed a right ear advantage for click-train (80/s) evoked emissions, and only 51.75 % of the infants showed a left ear advantage for tone evoked emissions. Further, only the click-train results agree with earlier studies. The tone-evoked results are in conflict with earlier results (as reported in the supplementary online material of the new article). Martin ---------------------------- Martin Braun Neuroscience of Music S-671 95 Klässbol Sweden web site: http://w1.570.telia.com/~u57011259/index.htm