Neural correlates of specific musical anhedonia

Although music is ubiquitous in human societies, there are some people for whom music holds no reward value despite normal perceptual ability and preserved reward-related responses in other domains. The study of these individuals with specific musical anhedonia may be crucial to understand better th...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Martínez-Molina, Noelia, Mas-Herrero, Ernest, Rodríguez Fornells, Antoni, Zatorre, Robert J., Marco Pallarés, Josep
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión aceptada para publicación
Fecha de publicación:2016
País:España
Institución:Universidad de Barcelona
Repositorio:Dipòsit Digital de la UB
OAI Identifier:oai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/108508
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/2445/108508
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Trastorns afectius
Emocions
Música
Affective disorders
Emotions
Music
Descripción
Sumario:Although music is ubiquitous in human societies, there are some people for whom music holds no reward value despite normal perceptual ability and preserved reward-related responses in other domains. The study of these individuals with specific musical anhedonia may be crucial to understand better the neural correlates underlying musical reward. Previous neuroimaging studies have shown that musically induced pleasure may arise from the interaction between auditory cortical networks and mesolimbic reward networks. If such interaction is critical for music-induced pleasure to emerge, then those individuals who do not experience it should show alterations in the cortical-mesolimbic response. In the current study, we addressed this question using fMRI in three groups of 15 participants, each with different sensitivity to music reward. We demonstrate that the music anhedonic participants showed selective reduction of activity for music in the nucleus accumbens (NAcc), but normal activation levels for a monetary gambling task. Furthermore, this group also exhibited decreased functional connectivity between the right auditory cortex and ventral striatum (including the NAcc). In contrast, individuals with greater than average response to music showed enhanced connectivity between these structures. Thus, our results suggest that specific musical anhedonia may be associated with a reduction in the interplay between the auditory cortex and the subcortical reward network, indicating a pivotal role of this interaction for the enjoyment of music.