Auditory and Visual Temporal Structuring: How Important is Sound to Musical Thinking?

Abstract

The main objective of the study was to find empirical support for a definition of musical aptitude in which musical thought processes are seen to exist out- side music, i.e. as perceiving and structuring visual temporal series. An auditory and a visual version of a temporal structuring test were administered to 203 comprehensive school pupils and 23 congenitally deaf subjects. A common component of auditory and visual structuring was found which explained approximately half of the variance in the scores, but modality- dependent perception processes also seem to have affected the results. Auditory stimuli seem to affect temporal structuring processes more strongly than visual stimuli, although the basic processes are very similar. The deaf subjects' results were very similar to those of the normal group in quality, but their mean was a little lower. The results are interpreted as showing that sound is not a necessary condition for musical thought processes, although it is the most effective means of communicating them.

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