Your Brain on Music, Super-Singing Songbirds, Animal Sunburns
Curiosity Weekly
Warner Bros. Discovery
4.6 • 963 Ratings
🗓️ 30 July 2021
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Learn about the social neuroscience of music; songbirds’ ultra-precise song control; and how animals can get skin cancer.
This is what happens in the brain when people make music together by Kelsey Donk
- What happens in the brain when people make music together? (2021). EurekAlert! https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-06/bu-whi060921.php
- Greenberg, D. M., Decety, J., & Gordon, I. (2021). The social neuroscience of music: Understanding the social brain through human song. American Psychologist. Advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/amp0000819
Songbirds have ultra-precise control over their singing, controlling frequencies under 1 Hz by Grant Currin
- Songbirds can control single vocal muscle fibers when singing. (2021). EurekAlert! https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-06/uosd-scc053121.php
- Adam, I., Maxwell, A., Rößler, H., Hansen, E. B., Vellema, M., Brewer, J., & Elemans, C. P. H. (2021). One-to-one innervation of vocal muscles allows precise control of birdsong. Current Biology. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.05.008
- Hays, B. (2021, June 4). Songbirds can precisely control single vocal muscle fibers while singing. UPI; UPI. https://www.upi.com/Science_News/2021/06/04/denmark-songbirds-fibers-vocal-control/4951622821325/
- Merlin Bird ID - Free, Instant Bird Identification Help and Guide for Thousands of Birds: https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/
Do animals that spend time in the sun get skin cancer? by Ashley Hamer (Listener question from Toby in Longmont, Colorado)
- Grey, H. (2018, June 28). Here’s How Much Damage a Really Bad Sunburn Can Do. Healthline; Healthline Media. https://www.healthline.com/health-news/heres-how-much-damage-a-really-bad-sunburn-can-do
- van der Weyden, L., Brenn, T., Patton, E. E., Wood, G. A., & Adams, D. J. (2020). Spontaneously occurring melanoma in animals and their relevance to human melanoma. The Journal of Pathology, 252(1), 4–21. https://doi.org/10.1002/path.5505
- Bryce, E. (2018, May 27). Do Animals Ever Get Sunburned? Livescience.com; Live Science. https://www.livescience.com/62677-do-animals-get-sunburned.html
- Gambino, M. (2011, July 8). Ask an Expert: Do Animals Get Sunburned? Smithsonian Magazine; Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/ask-an-expert-do-animals-get-sunburned-28218217/
- Why Would A Fish Make Its Own Sunscreen? (2015, May 13). NPR.org. https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/05/13/404444731/why-would-a-fish-make-its-own-sunscreen
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from Curiosity.com. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm Cody Goff. |
| 0:07.0 | And I'm Ashley Hamer. |
| 0:08.0 | Today you learn about what happens in the brain when people make music together, |
| 0:12.0 | and the ultra-precise control songbirds |
| 0:14.6 | have over their singing. We'll also answer a listener question about whether |
| 0:18.0 | animals can get skin cancer. Let's satisfy some curiosity. |
| 0:23.0 | Remember at the start of the pandemic when people sang songs together from their balconies? |
| 0:28.0 | Even after videos of this went viral, people kept singing, playing instruments, and making music together as we all got used to stay |
| 0:35.4 | at home orders and pandemic anxiety. |
| 0:38.8 | All that pandemic music making inspired neuroscientists to take a look at what happens in the brain when we make music together. |
| 0:46.0 | Their findings add more evidence to the idea that music is more than just entertainment. |
| 0:51.0 | It's central to human experience experience and it helps us connect with |
| 0:54.7 | others on a deep level. This might sound like old news but this study looked at |
| 0:59.8 | music making in a different way than others, |
| 1:02.5 | through the lens of social neuroscience. |
| 1:05.7 | Social neuroscience is a new field |
| 1:07.8 | that combines the stuff that happens inside the brain |
| 1:10.6 | with the larger context of the society and culture around us. |
| 1:14.8 | While previous studies have looked at what happens in the brain when an individual makes or |
| 1:19.0 | listens to music, along with how people react when they make music together, |
| 1:23.5 | not many have looked at what happens in the brain |
... |
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