Are you clueless about why your partner has an innate drive for music while you just cannot understand hip-hop or all that jazz? Blame it on your genes, says IANS.
Research suggests that genes that affect hearing and cognitive function may play roles in one’s musical aptitude – the ability to understand and perceive rhythm, pitch, timbre, tone durations and formal structure in music.
“The results show that genomic approaches can be applied to musical traits, that will, in effect, reveal new biological mechanisms affecting human evolution, brain function and civilisation,” explained Irma Jarvela from the department of medical genetics at the University of Helsinki, Finland.
The authors explained that extremes in musical aptitude (extreme capacity/no capacity) are rare within a population, with the majority of individuals having moderate aptitude.
“This is a typical feature of a complex trait attributable to several underlying genes and it is influenced to varying degrees by environmental factors, such as exposure to music or musical training,” Jarvela added.
Read the full, original story: Genes decide why some people love music
