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establishing whether there is any causal link between musical training, cognitive and linguistic skills and brain morphology/function.

There is not only evidence supporting greater reliance and development on left hemisphere brain structures because of musical training but also an improvement in spatial skills as well. According to this study ( Rauscher et.al. 1993) has shown that 10 minutes of listening to a Mozart sonata improves performance on spatial IQ tests. For Franklin the general consensus about this research is that improved performance does not result from listening to a particular type of music per se, but the enhancement of mood or arousal improves performance of a cognitive task. Recognising the controversial nature of the 'Mozart effect', Franklin points to studies based on musical training rather than simply listening to music. Bihartz et. al. (1999) is cited as research where musical training shows significant improvements with cognitive performance especially verbal skills. Alternatively Costa-Giomi (1999) is cited where low income groups of children were studied as they learned keyboard skills. This study found an improvement in spatial reasoning but no difference in verbal or quantitative skills. I would question whether it was the difference in income and/or the specific keyboard skills that caused the difference in results.

For Franklin et. al. (2008) the way that adult studies are more consistent then child studies in finding a difference between verbal memory in musicians and non- musicians suggests that spatial skills are enhanced with musical training. Franklin et al. theorise that it is possible over time that musical training leads to shifts in brain organisation and function. The hope is that research will eventually clarify the relationship between musicianship and verbal/cognitive skills and show that 'enhanced verbal rehearsal mechanisms are likely responsible for musicians verbal memory advantage.'

Amelee Racette and Isabelle Peretz

学习歌词：唱还是不唱？-Learning Lyrics: to sing or not to sing?

Memory and Cognition -2007 35 (2) 247-253

Racette and Peretz recall a long history behind the notion that music serves as a mnemonic technique for learning verbal material. From the Minstrels of old stories are still transmitted through songs (Calvert & Tart,1993; Rubin, 1995). Additional examples are learning the laws of physics through karaoke (Dickson & Grant, 2003) and learning ESL via songs (Medina, 1993). This study seeks to add to the understanding of this phenomenon both empirically and theoretically.

For RP the notion of music facilitating word recall is counter-intuitive as there is more to learn in a song than a text. Typically song learning has been assessed through written recall (Kilgour, Jakobson, & Cuddy, 2000; McElhinney& Annett, 1996; Wallace, 1994). The format change between perception and performance also brings a bias in word recall over the spoken version, as extracting words from the sung version requires the music component to be filtered out.. Additionally written recall involves the performance a task that is not familiar to participants. Typically lyrics are learned to be sung, not written. Therefore these is an expected advantage of singing over reciting words. This procedure has been used only once previously (Jellison& Miller, 1982), and the results were n