Reading music modifies spatial mapping in pianists

Tools

Stewart, Lauren; Walsh, Vincent and Frith, Uta. 2004. Reading music modifies spatial mapping in pianists. Perception and psychophysics, 66(2), pp. 183-195. ISSN 0031-5117 [Article]

Preview

Text
PSY-Stewart2004_GRO.pdf
Download (414kB) | Preview

Official URL: http://www.psychonomic.org/PP/

Abstract or Description

We used a novel musical Stroop task to demonstrate that musical notation is automatically processed in trained pianists. Numbers were superimposed onto musical notes, and participants played five-note sequences by mapping from numbers to fingers instead of from notes to fingers. Pianists’ reaction times were significantly affected by the congruence of the note/number pairing. Nonmusicians were unaffected.
In a nonmusical analogue of the task, pianists and nonmusicians showed a qualitative difference on performance of a vertical-to-horizontal stimulus–response mapping task. Pianists were faster when stimuli specifying a leftward response were presented in vertically lower locations and stimuli specifying a rightward response were presented in vertically higher locations. Nonmusicians showed the reverse pattern. No group differences were found on a task that required horizontal-to-horizontal mappings.
We suggest that, as a result of learning to read and play keyboard music, pianists acquire vertical-to-horizontal visuomotor mappings that generalize outside the musical context.

Item Type:

Article

Additional Information:

This version is the original publisher's pdf, which is made available with permission for personal, noncommercial scholarly or for nonprofit, educational classroom use.