| dc.description.abstract | The present study explored the connection between fluency of speech and musical experience, since subjects with schizophrenia spectrum disorder often show impaired verbal fluency and recent studies point to a considerable overlap in function and in brain regions between language and music. We used data of 81 participants with schizophrenia spectrum disorder and 33 healthy controls who were inter-viewed in the PRAAT- research. The following question was answered: Is there a significant correlation between musical experience and fluency of speech of people with schizophrenia spectrum disorder? First, we examined if participants with schizophrenia spectrum disorder and healthy controls differed in 6 measurements of speech that revolve around fluency: speech rate, articulation rate, average pause duration, percentage of phonation, percentage of time pausing and percentage of time speak-ing. As expected based on previous findings of speech deficiencies in schizophrenia spectrum disor-der, in 4 out of 6 speech variables differences between the two groups were significant: speech rate, articulation rate, percentage of phonation and percentage of speaking. As for the two other variables, percentage of time pausing and average pause duration were trending towards significance. Second, we established differences in both active as passive musical experience between the subjects with schizophrenia spectrum disorder and the healthy controls. The active musical domain consisted of years of regular daily practice and hours per day practice. The passive musical domain consisted of amount of live music events attended in the past year and the amount of minutes attentively listening to music per day. Subjects with schizophrenia spectrum disorder attended less music events than healthy subjects, but listened and played music for more hours per day. As an explanation for these findings, we proposed social withdrawal, a characteristic feature of people with schizophrenia spec-trum disorder. Third, we looked at correlations between musical experience and speech. As for the participants with schizophrenia spectrum disorder, attending live music events correlated with four speech parameters: percentage of phonation, percentage of speaking, speech rate and articulation rate, such that people with SSD who attended more events had higher percentages of phonation, spoke more during the interview, and had higher speech and articulation rates. It is clear though that we cannot identify live music events as a causal factor leading to better speech. Instead, we suggest this correlation might again be due to social factors. The fact that we did not find this correlation in the control group, might also be explained by the ceiling effect. Our findings should be used as a starting point to design larger confirmatory studies. | |
