The present studies investigated whether there is a developmental trend from holistic to analytic modes of processing in the perception of melodies. Children (5-to 10-year-olds) and adults were instructed to classify short melodies which varied systematically in four attributes. The subjects could learn the appropriate category assignments either analytically (by focusing on a single attribute) or holistically (by comparing melodies in terms of their overall similarity). The data show that even the youngest children learned the melodic categories more often analytically than holistically. Nevertheless, there was an age effect concerning the attributes that the analytic learners used for their categorisation. Whereas all children preferred attributes that were not melody-specific, especially loudness, adults concentrated on melody-specific attributes, especially melodic contour.
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