Cross, Liam; Pares, Narcis; Gali, Olga; Ercan, Sena Beste; Sayis, Batuhan; Heaton, Pam F. and Atherton, Gray. 2025. The Moving Mandala: Exploring the Pro-Social Effects of Musical and Non-Musical Synchrony in Children in a Virtual World. European Journal of Investigation in Health, Psychology and Education, 15(3), 39. ISSN 2254-9625 [Article]

Text ejihpe-15-00039.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (1MB)

Abstract or Description

Synchronous movement between individuals has been shown to increase pro-sociality, such as closeness and generosity. To date, synchrony research tests these effects using a variety of movement tasks, including musical and non-musical coordination. However, musical versus non-musical synchrony may have separable pro-social effects. To test this, we had 60 children immersed in an augmented reality space called the ‘Moving Mandala’ where they moved asynchronously with only visual cues, synchronously with only visual cues or synchronously with musical and visual cues. We then tested for differences in pro-social effects using sharing and proxemics tasks. Results showed that while the synchrony version of the mandala led to greater closeness in the proxemics task, the musical synchrony led to more pro-sociality on the sharing task. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Item Type:	Article
Identification Number (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.3390/ejihpe15030039
Additional Information:	Funding: This work was funded by UPF’s Planetary Wellbeing funding program (PW2021-PR05).
Data Access Statement:	Data available upon request.
Keywords:	entrainment; synchrony; coordination; pro-sociality; full-body interaction; mixed reality
Departments, Centres and Research Units:	Psychology
Dates:	Date Event 14 March 2025 Accepted 19 March 2025 Published
Item ID:	38713
Date Deposited:	15 Apr 2025 10:34
Last Modified:	15 Apr 2025 10:34
Peer Reviewed:	Yes, this version has been peer-reviewed.
URI:	https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/38713

View statistics for this item...

Edit Record (login required)