This Special Music Helped Preemie Babies’ Brains Develop
Listening to music helped preterm babies' brains develop, according to the results of a new Swiss study.
Move over, Baby Einstein: New research from Switzerland shows that listening to soothing music in the first weeks of life helps encourage brain development in preterm babies.
For the study, the scientists recruited a harpist and a new-age musician to compose three pieces of music.
The Lowdown
Children who are born prematurely, between 24 and 32 weeks of pregnancy, are far more likely to survive today than they used to be—but because their brains are less developed at birth, they're still at high risk for learning difficulties and emotional disorders later in life.
Researchers in Geneva thought that the unfamiliar and stressful noises in neonatal intensive care units might be partially responsible. After all, a hospital ward filled with alarms, other infants crying, and adults bustling in and out is far more disruptive than the quiet in-utero environment the babies are used to. They decided to test whether listening to pleasant music could have a positive, counterbalancing effect on the babies' brain development.
Led by Dr. Petra Hüppi at the University of Geneva, the scientists recruited Swiss harpist and new-age musician Andreas Vollenweider (who has collaborated with the likes of Carly Simon, Bryan Adams, and Bobby McFerrin). Vollenweider developed three pieces of music specifically for the NICU babies, which were played for them five times per week. Each track was used for specific purposes: To help the baby wake up; to stimulate a baby who was already awake; and to help the baby fall back asleep.
When they reached an age equivalent to a full-term baby, the infants underwent an MRI. The researchers focused on connections within the salience network, which determines how relevant information is, and then processes and acts on it—crucial components of healthy social behavior and emotional regulation. The neural networks of preemies who had listened to Vollenweider's pieces were stronger than preterm babies who had not received the intervention, and were instead much more similar to full-term babies.
Next Up
The first infants in the study are now 6 years old—the age when cognitive problems usually become diagnosable. Researchers plan to follow up with more cognitive and socio-emotional assessments, to determine whether the effects of the music intervention have lasted.
The first infants in the study are now 6 years old—the age when cognitive problems usually become diagnosable.
The scientists note in their paper that, while they saw strong results in the babies' primary auditory cortex and thalamus connections—suggesting that they had developed an ability to recognize and respond to familiar music—there was less reaction in the regions responsible for socioemotional processing. They hypothesize that more time spent listening to music during a NICU stay could improve those connections as well; but another study would be needed to know for sure.
Open Questions
Because this initial study had a fairly small sample size (only 20 preterm infants underwent the musical intervention, with another 19 studied as a control group), and they all listened to the same music for the same amount of time, it's still undetermined whether variations in the type and frequency of music would make a difference. Are Vollenweider's harps, bells, and punji the runaway favorite, or would other styles of music help, too? (Would "Baby Shark" help … or hurt?) There's also a chance that other types of repetitive sounds, like parents speaking or singing to their children, might have similar effects.
But the biggest question is still the one that the scientists plan to tackle next: Whether the intervention lasts as the children grow up. If it does, that's great news for any family with a preemie — and for the baby-sized headphone industry.
Two Conservative Icons Gave Opposite Advice on COVID-19. Those Misinformed Died in Higher Numbers, New Study Reports.
Sean Hannity (left) and Tucker Carlson each told their audience opposite information about the threat of COVID-19, with serious consequences for those misinformed.
The news sources that you consume can kill you - or save you. That's the fundamental insight of a powerful new study about the impact of watching either Sean Hannity's news show Hannity or Tucker Carlson's Tucker Carlson Tonight. One saved lives and the other resulted in more deaths, due to how each host covered COVID-19.
Carlson took the threat of COVID-19 seriously early on, more so than most media figures on the right or left.
This research illustrates the danger of falling for health-related misinformation due to judgment errors known as cognitive biases. These dangerous mental blindspots stem from the fact that our gut reactions evolved for the ancient savanna environment, not the modern world; yet the vast majority of advice on decision making is to "go with your gut," despite the fact that doing so leads to so many disastrous outcomes. These mental blind spots impact all areas of our life, from health to politics and even shopping, as a survey by a comparison purchasing website reveals. We need to be wary of cognitive biases in order to survive and thrive during this pandemic.
Sean Hannity vs. Tucker Carlson Coverage of COVID-19
Hannity and Tucker Carlson Tonight are the top two U.S. cable news shows, both on Fox News. Hannity and Carlson share very similar ideological profiles and have similar viewership demographics: older adults who lean conservative.
One notable difference, however, relates to how both approached coverage of COVID-19, especially in February and early March 2020. Researchers at the Becker Friedman Institute for Economics at the University of Chicago decided to study the health consequences of this difference.
Carlson took the threat of COVID-19 seriously early on, more so than most media figures on the right or left. Already on January 28, way earlier than most, Carlson spent a significant part of his show highlighting the serious dangers of a global pandemic. He continued his warnings throughout February. On February 25, Carlson told his viewers: "In this country, more than a million would die."
By contrast, Hannity was one of the Fox News hosts who took a more extreme position in downplaying COVID-19, frequently comparing it to the flu. On February 27, he said "And today, thankfully, zero people in the United States of America have died from the coronavirus. Zero. Now, let's put this in perspective. In 2017, 61,000 people in this country died from influenza, the flu. Common flu." Moreover, Hannity explicitly politicized COVID-19, claiming that "[Democrats] are now using the natural fear of a virus as a political weapon. And we have all the evidence to prove it, a shameful politicizing, weaponizing of, yes, the coronavirus."
However, after President Donald Trump declared COVID-19 a national emergency in mid-March, Hannity -- and other Fox News hosts -- changed their tune to align more with Carlson's, acknowledging the serious dangers of the virus.
The Behavior and Health Consequences
The Becker Friedman Institute researchers investigated whether the difference in coverage impacted behaviors. They conducted a nationally representative survey of over 1,000 people who watch Fox News at least once a week, evaluating both viewership and behavior changes in response to the pandemic, such as social distancing and improving hygiene.
Next, the study compared people's behavior changes to viewing patterns. The researchers found that "viewers of Hannity changed their behavior five days later than viewers of other shows, while viewers of Tucker Carlson Tonight changed their behavior three days earlier than viewers of other shows." The statistical difference was more than enough to demonstrate significance; in other words, it was extremely unlikely to occur by chance -- so unlikely as to be negligible.
Did these behavior changes lead to grave consequences? Indeed.
The paper compared the popularity of each show in specific counties to data on COVID-19 infections and deaths. Controlling for a wide variety of potential confounding variables, the study found that areas of the country where Hannity is more popular had more cases and deaths two weeks later, the time that it would take for the virus to start manifesting itself. By March 21st, the researchers found, there were 11 percent more deaths among Hannity's viewership than among Carlson's, again with a high degree of statistical significance.
The study's authors concluded: "Our findings indicate that provision of misinformation in the early stages of a pandemic can have important consequences for health outcomes."
Such outcomes stem from excessive trust that our minds tend to give those we see as having authority, even if they don't possess expertise in the relevant subject era.
Cognitive Biases and COVID-19 Misinformation
It's critically important to recognize that the study's authors did not seek to score any ideological points, given the broadly similar ideological profiles of the two hosts. The researchers simply explored the impact of accurate and inaccurate information about COVID-19 on the viewership. Clearly, the false information had deadly consequences.
Such outcomes stem from excessive trust that our minds tend to give those we see as having authority, even if they don't possess expertise in the relevant subject era -- such as media figures that we follow. This excessive trust - and consequent obedience - is called the "authority bias."
A related mental pattern is called "emotional contagion," in which we are unwittingly infected with the emotions of those we see as leaders. Emotions can motivate action even in the absence of formal authority, and are particularly important for those with informal authority, including thought leaders like Carlson and Hannity.
Thus, Hannity telling his audience that Democrats used anxiety about the virus as a political weapon led his audience to reject fears of COVID-19, even though such a reaction and consequent behavioral changes were the right response. Carlson's emphasis on the deadly nature of this illness motivated his audience to take appropriate precautions.
Authority bias and emotional contagion facilitate the spread of misinformation and its dangers, at least when we don't take the steps necessary to figure out the facts. Such steps can range from following best fact-checking practices to getting your information from news sources that commit publicly to being held accountable for truthfulness. Remember, the more important and impactful such information may be for your life, the more important it is to take the time to evaluate it accurately to help you make the best decisions.
Dr. Steffanie Strathdee, an infectious disease epidemiologist, saved her husband Tom from a superbug infection by mobilizing scientists around the world to help him access experimental phage therapy.
[Editor's Note: This is the fifth episode in our Moonshot series, which explores cutting-edge scientific developments that stand to fundamentally transform our world.]
Kira Peikoff was the editor-in-chief of Leaps.org from 2017 to 2021. As a journalist, her work has appeared in The New York Times, Newsweek, Nautilus, Popular Mechanics, The New York Academy of Sciences, and other outlets. She is also the author of four suspense novels that explore controversial issues arising from scientific innovation: Living Proof, No Time to Die, Die Again Tomorrow, and Mother Knows Best. Peikoff holds a B.A. in Journalism from New York University and an M.S. in Bioethics from Columbia University. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and two young sons. Follow her on Twitter @KiraPeikoff.