Abstract
BackgroundGrowing neuroimaging and clinical evidence suggests that the cerebellum plays a critical role in perception. In the auditory domain, the cerebellum seems to be important in different aspects of music and sound processing. Here we investigated the possible causal role of the cerebellum in two auditory tasks, a pitch discrimination and a timbre discrimination task. Specifically, participants performed a pitch and a timbre discrimination task prior and after receiving offline low frequency transcranical magnetic stimulation (TMS) over their (right) cerebellum.ResultsSuppressing activity in the right cerebellum by means of inhibitory 1 Hz TMS affected participants’ ability to discriminate pitch but not timbre.ConclusionThese findings point to a causal role of the cerebellum in at least certain aspects of sound processing and are important in a clinical perspective helping understanding the impact of cerebellar lesions on sensory functions.
Highlights
Growing neuroimaging and clinical evidence suggests that the cerebellum plays a critical role in perception
We found that interfering with cerebellar excitability via offline low frequency transcranical magnetic stimulation (TMS) significantly affected pitch discrimination, whereas it had no effect on timbre discrimination
In the pitch discrimination task real TMS counteracted learning effects that emerged in the other experimental conditions as faster responses in the post compared to the pre stimulation sessions
Summary
Growing neuroimaging and clinical evidence suggests that the cerebellum plays a critical role in perception. We investigated the possible causal role of the cerebellum in two auditory tasks, a pitch discrimination and a timbre discrimination task. Results: Suppressing activity in the right cerebellum by means of inhibitory 1 Hz TMS affected participants’ ability to discriminate pitch but not timbre. Accumulating evidence suggests that the cerebellum may play a critical role in non-motor functions, contributing to cognitive and emotional processing [3,4,5,6]. Neuroimaging evidence shows that the cerebellum is significantly active in neurologically unimpaired individuals during sensory discrimination, such as visual (and auditory) motion discrimination [15].
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