The primary aim of the proposed study is to investigate the neuroanatomical systems involved in perceiving emotion in music. Few studies have investigated the neural systems involved in music perception in general, and none have specifically investigated the neural systems for perceiving emotion in music. Neuropsychological and functional imaging studies implicate amygdala and right parietotemporal cortices in perceiving emotion in facial expressions and in prosody. Here, it is predicted that damage to these structures will impair perception of emotion in music. This prediction will be tested by comparing ratings of emotional music given by subjects who have lesions in target regions with ratings given by control subjects. To control for other auditory perceptual impairments, subjects' hearing thresholds and discrimination of simple melodies and rhythms will be measured. To determine if regions of the brain necessary for perceiving emotion in music are distinct from regions necessary for perceiving emotion in other types of stimuli, individual subjects abilities to perceive emotion in music will be compared to their abilities to perceive emotion in nonverbal sounds, prosody, and facial expressions. A large number of subjects (n=68) with focal brain lesions will be studied, and advanced three-dimensional lesion analysis techniques will be used to correlate damage to specific anatomical structures with impairments on experimental tasks. The findings will improve understanding of neural systems that subserve emotion and music perception, and they will inform strategies for treatment of patients with neurologic or psychiatric diseases that cause disorders of emotion or higher-level auditory function.
