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Abstract

The purpose of this study was 1) to examine the effect of psychomotor activities on achievement in temporal discrimination tasks; and, 2) to examine the interaction of this treatment with the cognitive style variable of field dependence/independence (FDI). A one-group pre-test-posttest design was utilized in the study. An intact class (n = 29) of normal fourth graders received eighteen class sessions in which musical concepts pertaining to tempo, meter and rhythm were reinforced through activities involving a psychomotor response. FDI was measured by means of the Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT); subjects were classified as field dependent (FD) or field independent (FI) on the basis of a median split of the GEFT. The following standardized tests were used as both pre- and posttests; 1) Music Aptitude Profile (MAP)-Meter; 2) MAP-Tempo; and 3) Intermediate Measures of Music Audiation (IMMA)-Rhythm.

Data were analyzed through repeated measures ANOVA procedures. Results indicated that pre- to posttest differences for IMMA-Rhythm and MAP-Meter and interactions with FDI were non-significant. For MAP-Tempo, the pre- to posttest difference and the interaction effect for FDI were statistically significant, with the interaction effect accounting for 15% of the variance.

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Field-Dependence/Independence,Movement-Based Instruction and Fourth Graders' Achievement in Selected Musical Tasks

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