- Email: [email protected]
Infant's preferences for consonance vs. dissonance and for major vs. minor in music
836
INFANT’S
PREFERENCES FOR CONSONANCE VS. DISSONANCE AND FOR MAJOR VS. MINOR IN MUSIC
Department
of Psychology,
Research
on early cognitive
equipped
Harvard
Marcel R. Zentner University, 33 Kirkland
and perceptual
with a broad set of abilities,
capacities
best documented
St., Cambridge
indicates
MA 02138
that infants enter the world
for the domains
of language,
visual
perception, object permanence and the understanding of causal relations and number. A growing body of literature suggests similar capacities for the perception of music. The present investigation centers around two fundamental facts in the psychology of music: (1) consonances are generally preferred to dissonances; (2) joy and sadness have their musical counterparts in the major and minor modes respectively. Children as young as 3 years of age associate the minor mode with sadness and the major mode with joy. Since 3 years is a long time for the environment to act on a child, it is not clear whether the reaction pattern for minor/major is inborn, learned or due to an interaction between the two. The same question remains to be answered for the consonance/dissonance dichotomy. Study 1 Method Subjects. Ten infants have been observed for pilot testing of the procedures. The current study will report on the data for 24 four month old infants (12 male, 12 female). Stimuli and Apparatus. Each infant is presented with a single melody of 35 set duration in two different versions, one consonant and one dissonant. This pattern of stimuli is then repeated using a second melody for a total of 4 stimulus conditions. Both melodies are Central-European folk songs. The stimuli were written using a computer program that controlled an attached music synthesizer. Procedure. The infant is placed in an infant seat and electrodes are attached. A speaker with an attractive pattern (bull’s eye) is to the infant’s right side, while in front and to the left there is a wall. The mother is in the room but outside the infant’s visual field. A baseline trial precedes the music. Design. Four groups of infants hear the two melodies, in both the dissonant and consonant versions in four different orders, presented in a repeated measures, latin square design. In contrast to most related studies, this investigation uses multiple Outcome measures. behavioral measures, including time spent looking at the bull’s eye-pattern, motor activity and facial expression, as well as physiological measures such as heart rate. Study 2 A group of 24 infants will participate in study 2. This study is identical both melodies are played in the major and in the minor mode.
to study 1, except that
Results Preliminary findings for study 1 suggest that 4 month old infants do react differently to consonances vs. dissonances and show preference for the former. This paper will present complete data on the 48 infants of the studies 1 and 2.
INFANT’S
PREFERENCES FOR CONSONANCE VS. DISSONANCE AND FOR MAJOR VS. MINOR IN MUSIC
Department
of Psychology,
Research
on early cognitive
equipped
Harvard
Marcel R. Zentner University, 33 Kirkland
and perceptual
with a broad set of abilities,
capacities
best documented
St., Cambridge
indicates
MA 02138
that infants enter the world
for the domains
of language,
visual
perception, object permanence and the understanding of causal relations and number. A growing body of literature suggests similar capacities for the perception of music. The present investigation centers around two fundamental facts in the psychology of music: (1) consonances are generally preferred to dissonances; (2) joy and sadness have their musical counterparts in the major and minor modes respectively. Children as young as 3 years of age associate the minor mode with sadness and the major mode with joy. Since 3 years is a long time for the environment to act on a child, it is not clear whether the reaction pattern for minor/major is inborn, learned or due to an interaction between the two. The same question remains to be answered for the consonance/dissonance dichotomy. Study 1 Method Subjects. Ten infants have been observed for pilot testing of the procedures. The current study will report on the data for 24 four month old infants (12 male, 12 female). Stimuli and Apparatus. Each infant is presented with a single melody of 35 set duration in two different versions, one consonant and one dissonant. This pattern of stimuli is then repeated using a second melody for a total of 4 stimulus conditions. Both melodies are Central-European folk songs. The stimuli were written using a computer program that controlled an attached music synthesizer. Procedure. The infant is placed in an infant seat and electrodes are attached. A speaker with an attractive pattern (bull’s eye) is to the infant’s right side, while in front and to the left there is a wall. The mother is in the room but outside the infant’s visual field. A baseline trial precedes the music. Design. Four groups of infants hear the two melodies, in both the dissonant and consonant versions in four different orders, presented in a repeated measures, latin square design. In contrast to most related studies, this investigation uses multiple Outcome measures. behavioral measures, including time spent looking at the bull’s eye-pattern, motor activity and facial expression, as well as physiological measures such as heart rate. Study 2 A group of 24 infants will participate in study 2. This study is identical both melodies are played in the major and in the minor mode.
to study 1, except that
Results Preliminary findings for study 1 suggest that 4 month old infants do react differently to consonances vs. dissonances and show preference for the former. This paper will present complete data on the 48 infants of the studies 1 and 2.