Tinnitus and musical hallucinosis: the same but more

Abstract

While tinnitus can be interpreted as a simple or elementary form of auditory phantom perception, musical hallucinosis is a more complex auditory phantom phenomenon not only limited to sound perception, but also containing semantic and musical content. It most often occurs in association with hearing loss. To elucidate the relation between simple and complex auditory phantom percepts a source localized electroencephalography (EEG) study is performed. The analyses showed in both simple and complex auditory phantoms an increase in theta-gamma activity and coupling within the auditory cortex that could be associated with the thalamocortical dysrhythmia model. Furthermore increased beta activity within the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and anterior insula is demonstrated, that might be related to auditory awareness, salience and its attribution to an external sound source. The difference between simple and complex auditory phantoms relies on differential alpha band activity within the auditory cortex and on beta activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and (para)hippocampal area. This could be related to memory based load dependency, while suppression within the primary visual cortex might be due the presence of a continuous auditory cortex activation inducing an inhibitory signal to the visual system. Complex auditory phantoms further activate the right inferior frontal area (right sided Broca homolog) and right superior temporal pole that might be associated with the musical content. In summary, this study showed for the first time that simple and complex auditory phantoms might share a common neural substrate but differ as complex auditory phantoms are associated with activation in brain areas related to music and language processing.

Keywords: Auditory awareness; Complex auditory phantoms; Load dependency; Memory; Musical auditory phantoms; Simple; Thalamocortical dysrhythmia; Tinnitus.