Effects of musical meditation training on auditory mismatch negativity and P300 in normal children

The auditory mismatch negativity (MMN) and P300 of event-related potentials were compared in normal children either with or without musical meditation training. The experimental group consisted of 11 subjects who had been trained with musical meditation for six months and the control group consisted of 12 subjects (matched for age, sex and grade) who had not received musical meditation. MMN amplitudes in the trained children were larger than those in the control group. In addition, the MMN amplitudes were identical in attend and ignore conditions for both groups. This evidence suggests that auditory brain function has been affected by musical meditation training. It thus suggests that the MMN is capable of assessing changes to the brain function in normal subjects. There were no significant differences in the P300 latencies and amplitudes between the two groups. This result suggests that MMN and P300 may reflect different aspects of the brain function.