My name is Matthew Seliger and I am an undergraduate student at Tufts University researching music cognition. I have always found myself drawn to different expressive outlets - from begging my parents to play violin when I was four to attending culinary school during my gap year - but with a distinct interest in a neuropsychological perspective on what makes these art forms meaningful and uplifting. For this reason, my research question seeks to investigate individual differences in how humans perceive and use rhythmic cues to support memory with the aim of supporting outcomes in music therapy. I will be examining EEG and behavioral data collected by the Tufts Integrative Cognitive Neuroscience (ICoN) Lab led by my mentor Dr. Elizabeth Race, with a focus on data collected from Parkinson’s (PD) patients, who are known to have memory and rhythm related deficits. 

My plan is to look at different EEG markers of entrainment, specifically Inter-trial Phase Coherence (ITPC) and Steady-State Evoked Potentials (SSEPs). ITPC is a measure of frequency alignment, or how well our brain signals match the external rhythmic signals, while SSEP is essentially a measure of aggregate of evoked responses at the different beat frequencies. Both share the principle that participants who are entraining (neurologically matching the beat) will show these markers when the beat occurs even if the auditory stimuli has no sound at that point (such as in the case of syncopated rhythmic patterns).

I will start by conducting an auditory analysis of the auditory and music stimuli the ICoN lab has used to identify the prevalence of the different rhythmic frequencies in the actual sound envelope. Then I will calculate the ITPC and SSEP measures of entrainment and compare those results between older adult and PD populations, with the hypothesis that entrainment is impaired in those with PD. Then, I will incorporate different behavioral and perceptual measures of rhythmic skill and cognitive capacity, such as the Beat Alignment Test and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, to see if and how these measures can predict entrainment on an individual level. Finally, I will apply these same analyses to higher beat frequencies (in musical language, subdivisions), to see if different individuals or populations respond differently to these harmonics.

Musicians often remark that music has the ability to heal people, and existing research has shown promising potential to fight the decline experienced by the increasing population of older adults suffering from neurodegenerative disease. I hope that my research can turn this potential into a reality through a more robust understanding of individual differences in rhythm perception, allowing scientists to tailor therapies to patients’ unique needs and relationship with music. For my Leadership in Action next summer, I am hoping to intern at a neurological music therapy (NMT) center to see how NMT is being used in real life and interact with the populations I am working to support.

I am excited for my Laidlaw journey over the next two years and looking forward to getting to know my fellow Tufts scholars and the incredible work they are doing!