Early Blindness and Musical Training Reduce Auditory Internal Noise, Enhancing Pitch Discrimination

A study published in the Journal of Neuroscience examined nine people who became blind before age two and 18 sighted participants, many of whom had musical training. All subjects performed two hearing tasks: detecting a tone in background noise and judging which of two tones had a higher pitch. Blind participants outperformed sighted controls only on the pitch‑discrimination task. Mathematical modeling revealed that their advantage stemmed from lower internal noise—more consistent and reliable brain processing of sounds—rather than improved cochlear sensitivity. Sighted musicians showed a similar reduction in internal noise, suggesting that musical training can mimic the neural adaptations seen in early‑blind individuals. The findings highlight internal noise as a key factor in auditory plasticity and point to the possibility of targeted training to improve hearing in people with visual loss or other sensory deficits.