Functional magnetic resonance imaging has shown that mothers, but not fathers, have increased brain cortical
activation in specific language processing areas when listening to infant - directed speech, suggesting that mothers have an intent to communicate and the difference in neural processing is experience - dependent.24 The mothers spoke more to infant girls than boys in early infancy.
The resemblance of the right - lateralised
activation profile
in processing non-local dependencies
in music with the left - hemispheric system
in language moreover suggests that processing hierarchical structures
in music and
language involves qualitatively similar mechanisms subserved by domain -
specific neural subpopulations.