Not all benefits of musicianship can be contained to just one region of the brain. Some of the benefits are more general. This page catalogs other useful benefits of musicianship away from specific regions of the brain.
- Higher Grades
When testing high school student, students who played an instrument had higher grades on average than students who did not play an instrument. This analysis was done in the Canadian public schools, which has a standardized curriculum. This way, it is safe to assume grades across students from difference school are comparable since each school learns the same things at the same times. (Schellenberg, 2006)
- Higher IQ
When testing 5 year olds of similar backgrounds, certain groups received music lessons when some did not. At the beginning of the experiment and at the end of it one year later, the children again were administered IQ tests. When holding constant factors of expected increase of intelligence from aging, the students who played an instrument had higher IQs than their peers who did not. (Schellenberg, 2006)
- Improved Neural Processing
Musicians have the ability to precess information faster than non-musicians (Schellenberg, 2006).
- Increased Gray Matter
Gray matter are the cells used in your brain during cognitive thought. They are most often associated with intelligence. Musicians have more gray matter cells in certain regions of the brain than compared to non-musicians (Gaser & Schlaug, 2003).
- More heavily myelinated white matter tracts
When fibers are myelined, it is the brains way of reenforcing a structure. Musicians have more myelinated white matter tracts as compared to non-musicians, which means the fibers used to communicate messages to different parts of the brain work more efficiently in musicians as compared to non-musicians (Bengtsson et al., 2005 qtd. Patston, Hogg & Tippet, 2007).