The Body That Thinks with Others – Toward an Embodied and Collective Musical Metacognition - SfN 2025 Brain Bee Ideas NIRS EEG

Consciousness in First Person

“I am consciousness in listening. When I play the piano on stage, I am no longer just fingers or memory — I am the flow between bodies. I am the moment when I breathe with the other and we become a single sound. I think through touch, feel through listening, and understand through the silence that binds us. The stage is not a place of ego, but of fusion. We are waves modulating one another, signals aligning, belongings vibrating. Every shared breath prepares the space for the unpredictable — the sublime.”

Introduction: Musical Metacognition through Evidence-Based Science

In music performance studies, metacognition is often addressed as an individual, reflective, and post-action mental process. However, a decolonial approach requires us to observe thought as an embodied and distributed movement, which emerges through interaction with others, the acoustic environment, and the body-instrument itself.

Within this context, tools like EEG and fNIRS can provide real-time physiological records of the shared musical experience:

• EEG (electroencephalography) detects attention states, inter-brain synchrony, and dissolution of the tensional self through microstates and alpha/theta wave patterns.
  
  

• fNIRS (functional near-infrared spectroscopy) reveals prefrontal and parietal modulations associated with self-regulation, flow, and distributed attention.
  
  

This combination of neurophysiological data allows musical research to advance with scientific evidence while respecting the subjective, embodied processes that shape artistic performance.

The Body That Thinks with Others

In high-level piano performance — especially in duos, trios, or chamber music — a phenomenon occurs that we define as Musical Distributed Cognition. The musician does not think alone: they think with others — in respiratory synchrony, emotional compass, micro-timing adjustments, and shared intention. This is not just technique; it is bodily connection with the shared sonic territory.

This state can be described as Zone 2: a state of high performance with neuro-affective safety, where proprioceptive and interoceptive tensions are calibrated to sustain action without rupture. This is where Fruição (flowful enjoyment) emerges — a state of heightened attention with a strong sense of belonging.

To Decolonize Is to Recognize the Body’s Intelligence

In Amerindian epistemologies, the body is both territory and knowledge. The concept of Apus (extended proprioception) teaches us that musical gesture is also a world-gesture. Playing is not merely execution — it is cohabiting an intersubjective space, it is belonging, it is generating Human Quorum Sensing (QSH) through music.

This vision expands metacognition to include the relational and spiritual dimension of performance. Here, spirituality is not metaphysical: it is DANA — the intelligence of DNA that organizes the body to exist in flow and presence.

Conclusion: Toward a Model of Embodied and Collective Metacognition

We propose a model of metacognition that is embodied, distributed, and relational, one that can be measured with EEG/fNIRS, but that honors the ways of knowing inherent in the performing body. This model can foster evidence-based research in the field of musical performance without trapping musicians within Cartesian logic — instead, it embraces the embodied intelligence of art.

References (without links)

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  Explores metacognition in music education and development strategies.
  
  

• Flavell, J. H. (1979). Metacognition and Cognitive Monitoring.
  Foundational reference for the concept of metacognition.
  
  

• Concina, E. (2019). The role of metacognitive skills in music learning and performing.
  Applies metacognition to instrumental practice.
  
  

• Power, A., & Powell, S. (2018). Understanding group music-making for chronic mental health.
  Highlights relational and emotional impact of collective performance.
  
  

• Schiavio, A., & Høffding, S. (2015). Playing together without communicating?
  Discusses pre-reflective and enactive joint musical performance.
  
  

• Rosa, R., Spahn, C., & Altenmüller, E. (2020). How do musicians experience flow?
  A systematic review on musical flow states.
  
  

• Ferronato, S. B., & Araújo, S. (2021). Fronteiras entre corpo e pensamento.
  Decolonial perspective on body and musical performance.
  
  

• Pereira Jr., A. (2007–2023). Triple-Aspect Monism Theory.
  Integrates physical, mental, and informational aspects of consciousness.
  
  

• Damasio, A. (1999). The Feeling of What Happens.
  Proposes mind as interaction between body, emotion, and consciousness.
  
  

• Graeber, D., & Wengrow, D. (2021). The Dawn of Everything.
  Reinterprets human organization from non-colonial perspectives.
  
  

• Berntson, G. G., & Khalsa, S. S. (2021). Neural Circuits of Interoception.
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• Jackson Cionek (various years).
  Original proposals in decolonial neuroscience: Tensional Selves (Eus Tensionais), Zone 2, Apus, Human Quorum Sensing (QSH), Damasian Mind, DANA, and Yãy hã mĩy.