Newborns can anticipate rhythmic patterns within days of birth

A PLOS Biology study found that sleeping newborns showed brain responses of 'surprise' when musical rhythms changed, indicating rhythmic predictions in infants only days old. The same study did not find evidence of melodic expectation, and it did not test effects of musical exposure or later developmental outcomes.

Newborns appear to anticipate rhythmic structure in music, according to a study published in PLOS Biology. Researchers tested 49 sleeping newborns by playing piano pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach while recording brain activity with electroencephalography (EEG). Earlier work has shown that fetuses can respond to music by around 35 weeks of gestation, but whether newborns form musical predictions had been unclear. The new work searched for brain signals of "surprise" when sounds violated listeners' expectations. Key findings: - The study reported that newborns' brains registered surprise when rhythmic patterns changed unexpectedly, suggesting infants can form rhythmic predictions within days of birth. - The experiment used 10 original melodies plus four altered versions with shuffled melodies or pitches while infants slept and EEG electrodes recorded brain responses. - Newborns showed stronger responses to unexpected rhythm changes than to altered melodic or pitch sequences, which the authors interpreted as rhythm processing being more developed at birth than melodic expectation. - Lead author Roberta Bianco and colleagues noted that rhythm appears robust at birth, while melodic expectations seem to develop later; the paper emphasized that how early experience shapes these trajectories remains an open question. - The study did not test whether playing music to infants accelerates development, nor did it examine broader outcomes such as language or emotional growth; related prior studies have linked musical intervention and a richer home musical environment to aspects of infant timing and language processing. Summary: The research indicates that rhythmic processing may be present from the first days of life, while melodic prediction is not yet evident. These results contribute to understanding early auditory development and raise questions about how experience might influence musical perception as children grow. Undetermined at this time.