Swing Dance Induced Brain Plasticity: Morphometry and Quantitative Study
Poster No:
1097
Submission Type:
Abstract Submission
Authors:
Chengyi Yuan1, Weishun Dong1, Qian Wang1, Xiao Wang1, Yanlin Yu1, Chu-Chung Huang1
Institutions:
1East China Normal University, Shanghai, China
First Author:
Co-Author(s):
Introduction:
Dancing has been regarded as an effective approach for improving cognitive and psychological health, in either older or young adults (Mitterová et al., 2021). To investigate the brain plasticity effect of dancing, traditional neuroimaging research has mostly focused on functional or gray matter morphological changes. However, the structural basis of brain functional change may not be linked with morphological information derived from non-quantitative image, such as T1w, which may be insensitive to short-term intervention, especially in young adults (Broessner et al., 2021). In contrast, quantitative MRI (qMRI) allows a more constant and specific measurement of tissue microstructure, which provide a new view to link structural and cognitive functional changes (Weiskopf et al., 2021) To better understand the structural reorganization underlying functional performance improvements, we conducted an interventional study on healthy adults to investigate the neural plasticity effect after partner dancing training, both traditional grey matter morphometry and qMRI indices were used.
Methods:
Seventeen healthy adults (9 females; mean age: 19.8 ± 1.3 years) with no prior dancing experience were included in the study. They underwent MRI scans before (Scan 1) and after (Scan 2) a five-week swing dance workshop lasting two-hours per week. Gray matter volume (GMV) was extracted following optimized voxel-based morphometry approach using T1w. MTsat map and R2* map were acquired using the multi-parameter mapping (MPM) approach (Tabelow et al., 2019) and co-registered to T1w image for further spatial normalization. T1w images from both scans were segmented by a within-subject template and warped to MNI space separately. For each time point, the same deformation was applied to the quantitative maps without modulation. A combined weighting/smoothing approach procedure was implemented on the quantitative maps (Draganski et al., 2011). The statistical threshold for each voxel was defined as uncorrected p < 0.005, with a minimum cluster size requirement of 100, 170, and 140 voxels for GMV, MTsat, and R2* maps, respectively. Further exploration on the correlation between brain structural alterations and cognitive functional changes was conducted on clusters showing significant difference in voxel-based analysis.
Results:
After 5 weeks of swing dancing training, participants demonstrated regional GMV increase in left superior temporal gyrus (STG), left cerebellar lobule VIII (CER3), right cerebellar lobule IV-V (CER4_5) and GMV decrease in bilateral middle cingulate & paracingulate gyri (ACG). We observed larger MTsat value in brain regions including left superior frontal gyrus-medial (SFGmedial), left middle frontal gyrus (MFG), left middle temporal gyrus (MTG), right anterior orbital gyrus (OFCant) and bilateral crus I of cerebellar hemisphere (CERCRU1). R2* demonstrated higher values in Right IFG pars orbitalis (IFGorb). A positive correlation emerged between the change of MTsat value in the left CERCRU1 and the change in Self-Acceptance Scale (SAQ) score (R2 = 0.37, p = 0.0124) while a negative correlation was found between the change of MTsat value in the left SFG-medial and the change in Susceptibility to Embarrassment Scale (SES) score (R2 = 0.291, p = 0.031).
Conclusions:
Our analysis demonstrates that partner dancing training can induce significant microstructural differences in the brain areas responsible for motor skill learning, action planning, task execution and social cognition. Additionally, we observed correlations between brain microstructural alterations and social cognition changes regarding mental health and interpersonal relationships. Our findings demonstrated that partner dancing may induce myelination in specific brain regions, suggesting the neural basis of social cognition improvement. These findings support the potential of partner dancing as a comprehensive intervention, integrating both exercise and social attributes.
Learning and Memory:
Neural Plasticity and Recovery of Function 1
Neuroanatomy, Physiology, Metabolism and Neurotransmission:
Cortical Anatomy and Brain Mapping
Cortical Cyto- and Myeloarchitecture 2
Keywords:
ADULTS
Plasticity
STRUCTURAL MRI
Other - Quantitative MRI; Microstructure; Partner Dance
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
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