1. Psychology of Music MUSED 681
REMINDER
Course Packet: $10 payable to Don Ester
eJournal Feedback
eJournal feedback via ; check assignment
Set up for class: laptop, speakers?, PMMA trial version

2. The Nature of Musical Ability
SEASHORE MEASURES OF MUSICAL TALENTS (1919)
Do you have musical aptitude? 
Give sample test to tease the topic: do a few of each - pitch, intensity, rhythm, consonance, tonal memory
:-) Show Grafanola and Pushmobile ad in Manual

3. The Nature of Musical Ability
Definition of terms
Capacity, potential, aptitude, ability Often misused as synonymns
Ability: a particular talent or ACQUIRED skill
Aptitude: a natural talent or ability for something, especially one that is not yet fully developed.
Achievement: current level of mastery
Assessing aptitude in an effort to predict future achievement
Ability is NOT the same as aptitude, really. This term should be used carefully, like the term “average” in statistics
Capacity = ability
Potential correlates with aptitude

4. The Nature of Musical Ability
All children (and adults) have some level of musical aptitude
What is the source of this aptitude?
Nature (Genetics) or Nurture (Environment)?
Public opinion = purely nature
“You have such a gift …”
True?

5. Nature or Nurture
How do we sort out genetic and environmental influences in research?
Studies of Twins
Consider pre-natal environmental influences
Drugs, stress, hormones, exposure to rhythm (heart beat), music, motherese NOT genetic (post conception), but how could we know?
Complexity of isolating variables in research
Twins article is an interesting examination of the nature-nurture
It appears that nurture is very important

6. Nature or Nurture
Genetic factors influence general development in three broad ways
Maturational Staged Development
Physical Capacity
Mental Capacity
Is there a “music gene”, or many specific related genes (intonation gene, etc.)?
More on this when we address Physiology and Perception & Cognition
When puberty?
Size? Shape?
Abstract thinking?

7. Nature or Nurture
Genetics contributes primarily to the similarities between siblings
Environment contributes primarily to the dissimilarities between siblings
My daughters do not LOOK like biological sisters to most people (share only 50% genetic material)
They share several basic personality traits (perfectionism). Nature or nurture?
My wife’s reaction when I shaved my mustache.

8. Nature or Nurture Shared Environmental Influences
Socio-economics of family
Parent’s musical interests
Educational opportunity
These contribute to similarities, as well.

9. Nature or Nurture Nonshared Environmental Influences
Placement of sibling (oldest, middle child, etc.)
Different friend groups
Varied musical experiences
Nonshared are more important for development of personality characteristics
Solicit Ss observations of own family re: nonshared influences
Is anyone a twin (identical?), what can you share?

10. Nature or Nurture
Most researchers (Csikszentmihalyi, Gordon) conclude that musical ability develops based on a complex and variable interaction of genetics and environment.
Absent Cause-Effect data (which is almost impossible to parce out and confirm), correlational data is valuable

11. Nature or Nurture
Known aspects of the Covariation between genetics and environment
Passive Child is “subjected” to the environment (parents “allow” him/her to sing in the car)
Reactive (Evocative) Child/Adolescent reacts to environment based on unique traits, which in turn evokes different environmental responses (parents, teachers, etc.)
Active Child/Adolescent/Adult actively selects or shapes environment to meet needs
Young child is exposed to certain music, movies, etc. Genetics control “learning”.
Child appears to “like/enjoy/be good at” making music; parents seek options for private study and/or ensemble experiences.
Adolescent organizes a “garage band”; my daughters sang together in talent shows (Shell station)

12. Environmental Influences
Musical Socialization
Learning process through which the individual grows into a musical culture, developing and adjusting his or her musical abilities, activities, ways of experiencing, and values in interrelation with the social, cultural, and material environment. (p. 19)
You can’t learn what you aren’t exposed to.
American music vs. Hungarian; implications for Kodály methodology
American teens don’t typically choose to play sitar or Shakuhachi or Didgeridoo

13. Environmental Influences
Situational Exposition The frequency and duration with which a person is exposed to a particular situation. (p. 18)
Nicole’s exposure to musical theatre as an infant/toddler/child/adolescent
Development of aural and vocal skills

14. Environmental Influences
Pre-natal environment (discussed earlier)
Infant environment Motherese, stroking, rocking, walking/pacing
Singing (many parents don’t anymore)
Listening (radio, TV, CD)
Solicit other

15. Environmental Influences
Early childhood & childhood environment
General musical environment
US: 93% of 6-9 yr. olds hear music in leisure time; 98% of MUCH larger influence than school music program, etc.
Concert attendance
Implications?
Tonal and Rhythm (metric) vocabulary
Preferences
Language usage (breadth of vocabulary, profanity, slang)
Types of concerts

16. Environmental Influences
Key Parental Roles
Early and continuous support of parents; very active up until age 11, moving to intrinsic motivation
Observe and encourage child’s early musical responses
Careful choice of teachers
How hard does one push?
Positive vs. Constructive feedback with youngest children
Teacher characteristics
(Several commented in eJournal that these things were “obvious”, “common sense”)
Consider: it was once “obvious” that the earth was flat and the sun circled the earth
it was once “obvious” that women were not smart enough to vote.

17. Environmental Influences
Key environmental factors maximizing
musical development
Early frequent and casual exposure to musical stimuli
Opportunities over an extended period of time to explore musical media
Early opportunities in music to experience intense positive emotional or aesthetic states
An opportunity to amass significant hours of practice
An opportunity to consistently observe and/or study with role models

18. Music Aptitude Tests WHY measure musical aptitude? Consider/Discuss:
There is nothing so unequal as the equal treatment of students of unequal ability.
Plato in The Republic
HOW measure musical aptitude? (sample recording)
For what purposes?
Tape of Kaylyn singing Supercalifrag …

19. Music Aptitude Tests
The first music aptitude test Seashore Measures of Musical Talents (most recent revision in 1960)
Present samples
Discuss: Is it measuring musical TALENT? Why or why not?
Theory: better hearing = higher talent level
Stimuli = isolated pitches produced by oscillators
Are those with Absolute pitch more talented musically?

20. Music Aptitude Tests
Issues concerning the measurement of musical aptitude?
Atomistic vs. Gestalt
Psychophysiological vs. Musical
(I can run fast and jump high; am I NBA material?)
I am (I wish) an amazing dribbler - when no one is guarding me

21. Music Aptitude Tests Validity Normal Distribution of musical aptitude
Reliability
Validity
Formal, Content
Predictive
Normal Distribution of musical aptitude
Taken from K-D Music Tests: “The authors constructed this test with the conviction that it would reveal significant correlation with sight-reading skill…. While this tone does not represent the only tone which would complete the melodic progression, it indicates the direction … in which the most satisfactory completion is to be found. SAYS WHO?
Context
Kindergarten entrance test story

22. Music Aptitude Tests
Gordon Musical Aptitude Profile (MAP) 1965, Revised 1995
Developmental Music Aptitude Stage
Birth (conception?) - age 9
Interaction of innate potential and environment
Stabilized Music Aptitude Stage
Age 9 and beyond
No environemntal affects
Provide copies of GIA catalog

23. Music Aptitude Tests Gordon Musical Aptitude Profile (MAP) Grades 5-12
3 sections (stimuli played on violin & cello)
Tonal (Melody & Harmony)
Rhythm (Tempo and Meter)
Musical Sensitivity (Phrasing, Balance, and Style)
Sections 1 and 2: determine same vs. different; one dimension is changed Section 3: preference between two phrases
Takes 3.5 hours to administer
Same vs. Different is objective
Preference is not
Show score sheet; Play examples from tape (as time allows
See Aptitude Lecture Tape for list of examples

24. Music Aptitude Tests Gordon PMMA, IMMA, AMMA
Tonal and Rhythm sections only
Primary Measures of Music Audiation (1979, 1986)
Grades K-3
Trial download:
Intermediate Measures of Music Audiation (1979, 1986)
Grades 1-4 (same design; advanced content)
Advanced Measures of Music Audiation (1989)
College Students
Short versions of MAP: only minutes
Demo PMMA trial download
Define audiation
Play examples from MAP for comparison (on my tape with Kaylyn)
Perhaps just the first example of Tonal Imagery, Melody so they can hear the level of expectation
Discuss subjectivity issues: continuum of objectivity correlated with musicality

25. Music Aptitude Tests
Per the text, Howe and Cattell maintain that “the close analysis of any ability is impossible without an understanding of three ‘modalities’: ability, personality, and motivation” (p. 5) Do you agree?
Note use of the term ability, rather than aptitude. And that one of the three “modalities” (ability) is the same term as the whole to which they refer. ??
The development of ability is mitigated by these factors, it certainly seems

26. Music Aptitude Tests How would you measure musical aptitude?
(Have your thoughts changed?)
How would you use aptitude data?
Understanding Music Aptitude article
Teachers estimated students’ aptitude; then Ss took MAP;
Data is qualitative: teachers thoughts about the matches/mismatches, value of aptitude tests

27. Instrument Selection & Assignment
Traits to consider?
Physical Traits Lips, fingers, jaw/teeth, hands, other
Ring vs. Index finger of LH!!??
Empirical evidence
Personality, Motivation
Solicit traits to consider first
My choice of oboe because it was “the hardest”

28. Instrument Selection & Assignment
Picture speaks for itself. Did Dizzy have the proper aptitude for trumpet?

29. Personality Effects CORRELATIONAL Research
Introversion: significant level of self-sufficiency (not “shyness”)
Isolation during practice time
Private/independent creativity
Solicit thoughts on personality aspect

30. Motivation Effects Addressed later in the term
Be cautious about competition – the theory that it INCREASES motivation is not supported by research, especially individual competition. Also, it limits the amount of repertoire studied.

31. Music Achievement Tests
Colwell MAT
Test 1: Pitch Discrimination, Interval Discrimination, Meter Discrimination
Test 2: Major-Minor Mode Discrimination, Feeling For Tonal Center,
Auditory-Visual Discrimination
Test 3: Tonal Memory, Melody Recognition, Pitch Recognition,
Instrument Recognition
Test 4: Musical Style (composers, texture), Auditory-Visual Discrimination,
Chord Recognition, Cadence Recognition
Achievement vs. Aptitude

32. Music Achievement Tests
Watkins-Farnum Performance Scale

33. Music Achievement Tests
How would YOU test for musical achievement?
Consider implications (ISTEP)
Assessment to match National and State Standards

34. Aptitude and Achievement
Research indicates that music aptitude is developmental during the early years of life. A child's aptitude at birth is innate, but can fluctuate until about age nine according to the richness and diversity of musical experiences the child undergoes. After age nine, one cannot expect to achieve in music beyond the limit of one's stabilized music aptitude. It is essential that children receive lots of high quality informal guidance and formal instruction in music in order to best realize their potential for musical fulfillment throughout life. Informal music experience prior to age five is particularly important. (Gordon)
Implications for public school music education
Dallas and Rockford music cuts
Sum up: nature AND nurture
Trying to determine how much of each may be a waste of time given
IDIC - infinite diversity in infinite combinations

35. Research Projects Guidelines Format & Length
see Update Contributor Guidelines
Content
see sample Update articles (and packet chapters) Cognition and motor execution in Piano Sight-Reading: A Review of Literature Sight-Reading Ability in Wind and Percussion Students: A Review of Recent Literature
Initial Prospectus Due Sept. 25
Idea Sharing

36. Next Week Reading assignments eJournal due Wednesday 8 AM
See 681 web site links:
Sound, Physics, and Music
Explore the four areas under Basic Concepts (Table of Contents on left)
Science Friday
Listen to archived audio
Read/explore info by clicking “Lend an ear to the physics of music” link
View/read information under Related Links
Music Physics
eJournal due Wednesday 8 AM
Continue work on Research Project

37. Safe Travels
SAFE TRAVELS