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Abstract

The affordances of objects in music education, such as tablets or musical toys, necessitate a domain-specific conceptual understanding to guide perception and bodily action, extending utilitarian values toward musical and educational goals. This article explores the concept of affordances in music education and elucidates the application of various types of affordances—specifically, cognitive, educational, mental, affective, and social—in the contexts of teaching and learning music. Several characteristics of affordances in music education were observed: (1) music serves as a form of communication, enabling learners to transcend established protocols in human interactions; (2) music is intertwined with the transmission of sociocultural and aesthetic values, as evidenced by historically informed musical practices and traditions; (3) engagement in music-making nurtures learners’ creativity and personal growth, fostering experiences that can be transferable; (4) music learning reveals individuals’ emotional capacities and expressiveness; and (5) music-making entails collaborative work, facilitating the development of interpersonal relationships and the construction of a community rooted in the values of equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI). Practical recommendations for enhancing affordances in music education can heighten its awareness to music educators and foster explicit learning design in the development of educational tools. These suggestions have the potential to unlock possibilities that may otherwise remain unrealized.

Keywords

ecological affordances cognitive affordances educational affordances mental affordances affective affordances social affordances

Amid a growing body of evidence highlighting the intellectual, social, and personal benefits of music education for young people (Hallam, 2010), efforts have been made in recent decades to remove barriers and ensure access to music education for all (e.g., Baker, 2014; Krupp-Schleußner & Lehmann-Wermser, 2018). These efforts have been complemented by technological advancements, pedagogical innovations, and increased attention to equality, guiding the overcoming of barriers to music learning. Approaches such as STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) and STEAM (i.e., STEM with the addition of Arts) (Turhal, 2020), mobile learning (Chen, 2017), culturally responsive pedagogy (McKoy & Lind, 2022), and inclusive and community engagement (Campbell, 2020) have been employed as alternatives to conventional approaches in music teaching and learning. These alternative approaches mark a shift from conventional settings in which learners receive instruction via a structured music curriculum that develops their musical competences in favor of a more interactive, engaging, and inclusive environment in which learners actively participate in their musical journeys. Objects and environments that are not intentionally designed for music-making, such as computers and general classrooms, are often repurposed as musical tools and spaces for exploratory and innovative music-making experiences. In order to facilitate the repurposing process and/or propose alternative educational users, an understanding of the properties of an object or environment that enable specific actions is necessary. Those properties that inform perceptions and actions associated with a particular environment, in the process facilitating the achievement of musical and educational goals, are known as affordances (Chong & Proctor, 2020). This article aims to explore the concept of affordances in music education¹ as it appears in the extant literature, together with its applications for music teaching and learning. To this end, different interpretations and variations of the concept are reviewed, along with suggestions for its practical implications in ways that inform best practice, particularly as they relate to the development of musical tools and the design of pedagogical approaches.

The concept of affordances was originally introduced by James Jerome Gibson (1977) to ecological psychology, a field of study in which the relationship between an organism and its environment is emphasized. The term affordances refers to the possibilities for action that occur in the perceptual domain, taking into account both the properties of the environment itself and one’s own capabilities (Gibson, 1979). The concept of affordances lies in the idea that perception does not primarily present the raw characteristics or epistemic invariants of its objects, but rather includes the perception of what one can do with such objects. Perception is attuned to the information available from the environment, enabling organisms to perceive those actions that are relevant to their goals and capabilities. Organisms can perceive affordances directly, without the need for complex cognitive processes or internal representations. In contrast, traditional cognitive approaches emphasize the role of mental representations and perceptive processing in order to move beyond the ontological rift between perceiver and environment (Estany & Martínez, 2014).

Although the Gibsonian affordances is an open-ended concept that allows for flexible interpretations, there are nevertheless challenges in developing it as an alternative framework to cognitivism due to the inadequate clarity of its ontology (Chemero, 2003). Its development in various disciplines has not only been complex and multifaceted but also characterized by interpretations, debates, and refinements. One of the primary concerns in the extant literature is lack of conceptual unity. Affordances are defined in a variety of ways (López-Silva et al., 2022), which has led to discrepancies between the way they are interpreted in relation to different phenomena. For example, some proponents argue that affordances are properties of the animal-environment system that provide opportunities for action (Chemero, 2003; Stoffregen, 2000a, 2000b; Warren, 1984), while others believe that affordances are dispositional properties of the environment that afford particular actions or interactions (Heras-Escribano, 2019; Scarantino, 2003; Turvey, 1992); in both cases, affordances are considered to be real and capable of creating information (Golonka & Wilson, 2012). It has also been discussed whether affordances are normative (Chemero, 2009; Heras-Escribano & de Pinedo, 2016) and linked to global tasks, or if they operate at a more local level (Kimmel, 2012; van Dijk & Rietveld, 2020).

As the concept of affordances has become more popular, it has not only been interpreted in discrepant ways but also varied (Chong & Proctor, 2020), leading to the differentiation of cognitive, educational, mental, affective, and social affordances. Each has its own emphases and may be more or less relevant across disciplines. Since music education is a multifaceted field that intersects with various disciplines including psychology, sociology, neuroscience, and education, among others, types of affordances offering a comprehensive framework for analyzing the complex interactions between learners, educators, musical content, and educational environments are likely to be particularly useful. In this article, we draw on cognitive, educational, mental, affective, and social affordances to inform the development of instructional strategies, curriculum design, assessment practices, and policy decisions in the context of music education.

Affordances in music and music learning contexts

Music affords a range of activities such as dancing, coordination, persuasion, emotional release, marching, and foot-tapping (Clarke, 2005). Engaging in activities such as these provides feedback to the body and brain, enhancing various motor, attentional, and regulative capacities that contribute to the generation and sustaining of emotional experiences (Krueger, 2014). Bodily movements, together with the motor and mental imagery that result from experiences of making music and their subsequent effects on the human body, are essential components of affordances in the musical context (Reybrouck, 2005). These components affect individual situations and the aesthetic qualities of musical structures and performance (Rolvsjord, 2016). Similarly, the abilities and skills of the listener play an important role in the perception of bodily actions through the lens of musical affordances. In short, the affordances of music as perceived by the listener, depend on both the qualities of the music and the perceiver, how the perceiver connects music to other objects, and how they interact with and respond to music once its affordances are activated (DeNora, 2003; Krueger, 2011).

When applied to music education, the concept of affordances encompasses the potential or opportunities for music learning and the development of musical competencies that can be provided by objects and environments. These objects are not limited to tools or instruments specifically designed for music or music education but can also include items unintended for musical purposes, such as tablets (Sabet, 2020), smartphones (Cheng & Lam, 2023), or even tin cans (Cage, 1942). Similarly, the environment in which music learning takes place can refer to physical spaces, cultural contexts, or social interactions, ranging from a traditional music classroom (Gall & Breeze, 2005) to a virtual community (Veblen & Waldron, 2023). The appropriation of objects and environments tailored to the abilities of learners can reveal pedagogical opportunities not limited to musical achievement, which also embrace affective and mental contentment in ways that are beneficial to learners’ personal growth (Peñalba et al., 2021).

Despite its limited epistemological development, affordances in the musical context remain highly relevant. For instance, a keyboard instrument can be examined through its suitability for performing a selected piece of music or the way it conveys a particular artistic expression (Mooney, 2011), both of which can help facilitate the development of musicianship and motor skills through instrumental practice. An example of the dual-purposed affordances in the keyboard instrument is found in Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier (BWV846–893), a musical composition that explores the artistic potential of the instrument by requiring the player to perform in all 24 major and minor keys, while also serving as a pedagogical resource “for the profit and use of musical youth desirous of learning” (Bach, 1722; Ledbetter, 2002). During the early stage of their development, pianos and other orchestral instruments were categorized as music technology due to the innovative mechanical engineering techniques employed in their design (Cary, 1992). The range of tools used for composing and performing music has continuously advanced and expanded, leading to a significant body of research exploring the relationship between affordances in music education and the use of technology. This research has been fuelled by the remarkable progress in technological capabilities (cf. Miranda, 2021), as well as the increasing accessibility and affordability of computational devices, all of which have advocated for the adoption of more constructivist pedagogical approaches in recent decades (Dorfman, 2022). In just the same way that the development of music competencies has been fuelled by non-musical items, music technologies that were not originally intended for educational purposes, such as digital audio workstations, have now been recognized for their potential to facilitate learning (Duncan, 2021; Pierard & Lines, 2022).

Cognitive affordances

Cognitive affordances, sometimes referred to as perceived affordances (Norman, 1999), are experiences that present the possibilities for action relative to an organism with certain abilities (Jorba, 2019). They represent the potential of an object or environment to elicit specific types of cognitive processing or behaviors, such as perception, memory, attention, and decision-making. While the concept of cognitive affordances is commonly explored in the context of technology and human-computer interaction design, such affordances are also utilized in cognitive science and education to identify ways of enhancing user experience and promoting effective learning (Liang et al., 2022; Martinez & Burton, 2011).

Clark and Chalmers (1998) proposed the hypothesis of extended cognition, which argues that some cognitive processes and mental states can and do happen outside the brain, extending to our bodies, the tools and technologies we use, and the spaces in which we learn and work (Clark, 2008). This hypothesis helps our understanding of the complexity of cognitive functioning in music-making and learning, particularly the embodied, enactive, embedded, and extended (known as the 4E) nature of music (Ryan & Schiavio, 2019; Schiavio & van der Schyff, 2018). The perspective of embodied cognition emphasizes the inclusion of physical properties, such as the body and the dexterity of the musician’s hands, in understanding the cognitive aspects involved in music creation (Reybrouck, 2005; Tullberg, 2022); it is closely related to enactive cognition, which focuses on how music players and learners organize their knowledge by interacting with their environment such as their instruments and other musicians (Reybrouck, 2012). Loaiza (2016) suggested that the enactive approach to cognition is better suited to dealing with the understanding of music, respecting both global complexity and localized individuality, as well as their systemic co-determination. This view aligns with other proponents of 4E cognition, who argue for a more flexible understanding of how agents across different cultural and social contexts actively participate in musical activities (Moran, 2014), leading to new possibilities for the development of novel approaches and useful tools for research and theory that align closely with the 4E perspective (van der Schyff et al., 2018). These include the mathematical approach, which explores the understanding of coordination among improvising musicians leading to new discoveries arising from the novelty of spontaneous musical action (Walton et al., 2015), and the biocultural perspective that attempts to break through the binary opposition between understanding music as a naturally selected adaptation and as a product of culture (van der Schyff & Schiavio, 2017).

The 4E framework offers a holistic approach for exploring the nature of musical experience, suggesting that music cognition is not solely confined to the relationship between music and the brain, but is intertwined with the body, the environment, and social interactions. Cochrane (2008) further argued that music not only influences, but also partially constitutes, the musician’s emotional state, adding value to the emotional content of the music itself and the virtuosity of the musician’s skills. This view is supported by Krueger (2014), who argues that the act of music-making grants access to novel emotional experiences that are otherwise inaccessible. In short, music affords access to emotions, extended emotions, and their regulation; when the individual engages attentively with music, their cognitive functions are offloaded onto the emotional responses associated with the musical activity itself, forming part of the vehicle needed to realize these emotional experiences.

Researchers have observed emerging elements of cognitive affordances in music education, particularly in the integration of technology (Einarsson & Ziemke, 2017), collaborative experiences (e.g., de Bruin et al., 2020), and the creative process (e.g., Peñalba et al., 2021). As affordances are relative to skill (Noë, 2004), the sensorimotor relationship between players and the tools they use for making music plays a crucial role in shaping musical experiences and learning outcomes. Tullberg (2022) proposed that the affordances of musical instruments, serving as the main tools for making and learning music in conventional settings, are dependent on the knowledge and skills of their player, as well as their attention to the musical task and the task itself. This proposal is supported by Magnusson (2009), who considered musical instruments to be cognitive extensions of musicians, pointing particularly to the rational foundations of digital musical instruments as epistemic tools, conveyors of knowledge used by an extended mind. Nijs (2017) provided the apparently contrasting view that a musical instrument is a natural extension of the body, arguing that the merging of musician and instrument is an embodied interaction during music performance (Nijs et al., 2013). However, Nijs also emphasized the importance of a musician’s skills, pointing out that a professional musician is more likely to integrate the musical instrument into the embodied experience of playing music (Nijs, 2017). This view is similar to that of Tullberg (2022), who agreed that musical skills are situated in the sensorimotor relationship.

The concept of cognitive affordances is a valuable tool for understanding interactions among musicians, between musicians and their instruments, and between musicians and the musical environment in music-making and learning contexts. Embedded in the 4E framework, it illuminates the relationship between cognition, embodiment, and the sociocultural context of musical experience. It thus is useful in showing how music-making extends beyond mere brain activity to encompass the physical, social, and cognitive processes involved in creating and learning music.

Educational affordances

The concept of affordances is often applied to the fields of education and technology-mediated learning as a means of understanding the relationship between the two, in the process highlighting the interconnectedness of perception and action (Oliver, 2005). Kirschner (2002) defines educational affordances as those characteristics of an artifact that determine whether and how specific forms of learning behavior can occur. The unfolding of specific types of learning is determined by, and involves, the interplay between the properties of an educational intervention, environment, or tool, and the learner’s characteristics. The concept of educational affordances serves as a tool for investigating and examining how constructive learning can be enhanced by exploring the opportunities for potential interactions with specific objects across diverse educational settings.

In the context of music-making, objects and environments help learners engage in the process of creating music. For instance, a musical instrument can be used to develop learners’ instrumental skills, while a rehearsal room with proper acoustic treatment can facilitate the development of ensemble skills among orchestral players. Similarly, a digital audio workstation can provide opportunities for novice producers and students to explore different studio practices and learn composition (Duncan, 2021; Pierard & Lines, 2022). GarageBand, for example, offers a comprehensive solution for music learners, enabling them to bypass a lengthy period of training in musicianship and providing a tangible and effortless approach to creating music (Bell, 2015). However, the differences between the contexts of making music and learning to make music respectively indicate that an object or environment can be optimized to offer more effective opportunities for musicianship training, especially when the design of music software is taken into consideration (Cheng & Leong, 2017). New possibilities for enhanced engagement in music teaching and learning can be created by considering factors such as the multimodality of music software (Gall & Breeze, 2005). This means that the affordances of music software can be leveraged to provide learners with diverse sensory and interactive experiences, fostering a deeper understanding and enriched engagement with musical concepts and practices.

Educational affordances in music-learning contexts must also take into consideration learners’ existing knowledge and skills. Jennings (2007) argued that formal musicianship training, including instrumental skills and music theory, can both facilitate and limit learners’ compositional ideas. She therefore advocated the use of graphic notation as an alternative representation of musical information, enabling beginner composers to engage in composition independently, regardless of their prior knowledge or skills. This finding is supported by Cheng and Lam (2023), who designed a motion-based digital musical instrument (DMI) mobile app that empowers children with the ability to learn music and facilitates their engagement in helpful music and movement activities, fostering their musical creativity. These authors highlight the fact that technology itself is not neutral, since instrumental and interface design can subtly shape the musical and non-musical actions of learners during human-computer interactions. Widely used as a self-contained, fast-track music-composition teaching unit in schools (e.g., Chen, 2020; Sabet, 2020), GarageBand allows students with and without prior musicianship training to enjoy the process of creating their own compositions. It safeguards students from undesirable musical outcomes by providing protective guides, which may also potentially delimit the development of musical creativity afforded by the digital audio workstation (Bell, 2015).

According to the philosophy of praxial music education put forward by Elliott (1995, 2005) music pivots on particular kinds of human doing-and-making activities that are purposeful, contextual, and socially embedded. Challenging the narrow focus on abstract, atomistic content and isolated skills of the traditional music curriculum, its advocates argue for a well-rounded musical education that engages learners in musical actions, transactions, and interactions that closely parallel music cultures in the real world. Music embodies sociality, and the music curriculum has much to offer beyond musicality and aesthetics (Regelski, 2016). Hallam (2010) suggested that music learning has the potential to foster intellectual, social, and personal development, while the concept of affordances encompasses attributes that can contribute to personal growth. In short, music education should go beyond its narrow focus on musicianship and technical training.

Music education embraces non-musical learning achievements, besides the development of competency and personal growth, that can serve broader societal purposes. For example, culturally responsive teaching in music education can promote the multicultural understanding of learners, helping them explore, understand, and appreciate different music cultures (McKoy & Lind, 2022). Culturally responsive teaching can also strengthen intercultural understanding among students in the music classroom, particularly those whose culture and language differ from those of the majority of the population (Barton & Riddle, 2022). In a study by Pang et al. (2024), cultural transmission was discovered through gamified learning experiences, inspiring the interest of a younger generation in Cantonese opera and contributing to the preservation of traditional art forms as cultural heritage. Similarly, musical engagement can offer opportunities for participants to reflect on their social identities, relationships, and responsibilities in their communities and broader society, contributing to political advocacy and positive social transformation (Cheng & Lam, 2023).

Educational affordances reflect the development of music competencies in music-learning contexts. Engagement in music learning helps foster learners’ creativity and personal growth, nurturing transferable experiences in the process. As a result of historically informed musical practices and traditions associated with music, such learning experiences can also facilitate the transmission of sociocultural and aesthetic values.

Mental affordances

Mental affordances refer to the opportunities for mental actions that a given environment or object provides to an individual. These mental actions encompass various cognitive processes, such as imagination, counting, and arithmetic (McClelland, 2020). Unlike cognitive affordances, the concept of mental affordances emphasizes the embodied nature of our cognitive activities and rejects a strict delineation between bodily and mental actions (Bruineberg & van den Herik, 2021). In the context of music, the key difference between cognitive and mental affordances is that the first focuses on the sensorimotor interactions in collaborative and creative music processes, while the second focuses on the internal mental processes of an individual (Bruineberg & van den Herik, 2021; Di Paolo et al., 2017; Reybrouck, 2021). McClelland (2020) has explored the concept of mental affordances in music education specifically in relation to focal attention whereby an individual is engaged in a particular task with music serving as a continuous distraction. This scenario allows for a musical activity to take place within an attended space, its demands being recognized in the contexts of both active music making and receptive music listening, as well as the individual’s stored memories or mental representations of the environment (Heft, 2020). For example, a student may be playing music on one instrument from a score, only to become distracted by another student playing another melody on their own instrument in the same rehearsal room. Alternatively, the student may be preparing to take a school test while simultaneously being aware of friends chatting and playing music in the next room. In both scenarios, mental affordances in the form of focal attention to music are only possible if (1) the individual is consciously paying attention to the music rather than simply being aware of it; (2) the music is non-referential and serves as a direct stimulus; and (3) the music is of more interest than the task in hand (McClelland, 2020). These conditions suggest that mental affordances in the context of music learning are linked to auditory perception, environmental awareness, and cognition in relation to the space.

McClelland (2020) further argued that mental affordances require two qualities of attention, overt and covert. Physiological processes enable individuals to respond to the properties of specific stimuli, such as music, with overt attention. Concentration allows individuals to engage actively with music through their conscious awareness, paying covert attention. Like cognitive affordances, whereby individuals can choose how they engage with music (Coessens & Östersjö, 2014; Menin & Schiavio, 2012; Windsor & de Bézenac, 2012), mental affordances—particularly their hybrid nature in music education settings—can help individuals to recognize the resistance they may have toward invitations to redirect their attention.

Affective affordances

The concept of affective affordances refers to emotional and affective impacts on individuals’ embodied experiences (Hufendiek, 2017). In this domain, people, places, and objects are seen as providing opportunities for the phenomenal and temporal aspects of our affective experiences to be regulated and shaped via amplification, suppression, extension, enrichment, and exploration (Krueger & Colombetti, 2018). The concept of affective affordances has been studied extensively in relation to individuals’ engagement with technology, particularly in terms of understanding their emotional experiences and how they may be shaped by the design of human-computer interactions and artificial intelligence (Scarinzi & Cañamero, 2022; Shin, 2017; Twigt, 2018).

According to Rietveld (2008), affective functioning in music education can begin when children are very young, as they learn about their surroundings and how their bodies respond physically to music (Doughty et al., 2016; Haslbeck, 2004; Zentner & Eerola, 2010). People explore and regulate their emotions when they are listening to music and orienting themselves in relation to their surroundings (Clark & Chalmers, 1998; Krueger, 2014). Music is said to have affective allure, insofar as human beings apparently find it irresistible, because of its personal meaning to them. It enables them to draw on their awareness of their own and others’ emotional state and carry out both simple everyday tasks and more complex, synchronized activities (Brown & Parsons, 2008; DeNora, 2000; Parncutt, 2009). Thus, participating in community music groups for adults has been shown to foster social well-being (Tapson et al., 2018), and preterm infants who were exposed to music before birth have been found to be more competent both cognitively and affectively (Krueger, 2014). If infants are not exposed to music and the potential for its affective allure, they may develop shorter attention spans and behavioral delay (e.g., DeNora, 2000), and find it difficult to synchronize their bodily movements with sounds including music (e.g., Dalla Bella & Peretz, 2003).

The concept of affective affordances has been discussed extensively by scholars in the area of affective synchrony (e.g., Janata et al., 2012; Phillips-Silver & Keller, 2012; Trevarthen & Malloch, 2002). This refers to the emotional experiences associated with music making especially when synchronizing with other people or playing in time with a regular beat. Examples include listening to and performing music simultaneously (Waddington, 2017) and the enjoyment of moving to music whether spontaneously or intentionally (Janata et al., 2012; Madison, 2006).

Affective affordances offer a way of understanding the regulatory function of music, such that they help organize listeners’ emotional responses to it (Jorba, 2019; Krueger, 2014; Timmers et al., 2020). Composers use the cognitive affordances of music to shape listeners’ engagement via the control of formal structure and the use of dynamics (Krueger, 2014). Regardless of the style or genre of the music, these elements constrain the hierarchical organization of music, which in turn elicits entrained emotional responses based on its rhythmic and melodic contours (Windsor & de Bézenac, 2012).

Affective affordances in music education also include agency (Krueger, 2014). Individuals exert emotional motor control, monitoring and regulating the timing of their movements while they are listening to music according to their goals for listening and the feedback they receive from their bodies. The role of agency highlights the physiological function of affective affordances and underscores the importance of timing (Fritz et al., 2013). It can be hard for learners and listeners to exert emotional motor control, however, particularly when there are sudden changes in the environment. Emotional experiences associated with affective affordances can be disrupted, for example, by the loss of a Spotify or YouTube playlist when a device has a dead battery (Lim et al., 2009). They are therefore shaped by personal circumstances influenced by the immediate environmental constraints (Krueger, 2014).

Affective affordances are concerned with the emotional experiences shaped by musical engagement. Learning music when young and being exposed to its expressive potential can help individuals explore and regulate their emotions, but it also has its uses in other contexts such as fostering social well-being in community music groups and achieving therapeutic goals.

Social affordances

Social affordances relate to the possibilities for the collective social actions, behaviors, or interactions that are influenced by social practices and norms (de Carvalho, 2020). They are not limited to the physical properties of objects and environments, but include their cultural, historical, and social contexts (Rietveld, 2012) and are shaped by social norms, conventions, and expectations.

While language conveys meaning, including emotions, through words, music is universal, transcending the limitations of speech and writing (Cross, 2014; Dayan, 2006) to serve as an alternative means of communication. School children can be introduced to musical communities of practice (Sawyer, 2006) whereby children play music together in the classroom. Sharing their musical experiences is a form of socialization that enhances their social development not only in childhood but throughout the course of music education in school and other contexts. Playing, listening to, and composing music all promote social as well as musical interactions with others in the wider community (Keller et al., 2011).

Non-verbal communication is an important aspect of collaborative music-making, enabling players and/or singers to interact and coordinate with each other using the sensorimotor, cognitive, and social skills they have developed through learning music and training as ensemble performers (D’Ausilio et al., 2015). Technology offers opportunities for interaction, collaboration, and performance in socially and musically connected environments (Crook, 1994) in which the physical proximity of musicians is no longer necessary. In the field of immersive technology, for example, telematic systems were introduced as a new category of musical instrument (Braasch, 2009). For example, Cheng (2019) showed how members of a laptop ensemble developed their musical and interpersonal communication skills. They used physical gestures and eye contact to connect emotionally with each other through musical expression, just like players of acoustic instruments in orchestras (Kendall & Carterette, 1990).

Music education includes teaching social skills that are invaluable for achieving societal goals. Initiatives such as Music for All (Barrett, 2009) and El Sistema (Baker, 2014) aim to foster their participants’ personal development as well as to offer musicianship training; they also try to create inclusive groups in which children are empowered to become agents of their own future and global citizens. Children who are given positive musical experiences are likely to develop a sense of their own individuality and self-worth, and to embrace diverse musical identities (Cabedo-Mas & Díaz-Gómez, 2013). These are essential elements of social justice. Also, music education can foster community building by encouraging collaboration and teamwork. Learners can bridge their individual differences through collaborative music-making, which can help the creation of a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive community (Campbell, 2020). Dillon and Brown (2010) explored the capabilities of social affordances in a network jamming system, arguing that meaningful engagement in collaborative music-making fosters interactional and relational engagement, leading to community development and learning opportunities.

Social affordances expand the relationship between the organism and its environment within the framework of different sociocultural contexts. As a non-verbal means of communication, music is an alternative to spoken and written language. Music education can have societal goals, such as building communities, developing interpersonal relationships, and promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI).

Practical implications

In the previous sections of this article, I have provided an overview of five variations of the concept of affordances in music education. They extend beyond narrowly defined utilitarian aspects of music education, suggesting how learners can maximize their resources and overcome the barriers they face. The concept of affordance in music education highlights several characteristics of music: (1) it is a form of communication that does not require learners to use spoken or written language (2) it transmits sociocultural and aesthetic values, as evidenced by historically informed musical practices and traditions; (3) it nurtures the creativity and personal growth of learners who engage in active music making, providing skills that can be transferable to other activities; (4) it reveals the capacities of learners for both having and expressing emotional experiences; and (5) the making of music is collaborative, facilitating the development of interpersonal relationships and the construction of a community rooted in the values of EDI.

Recent explorations of the concept of affordances in music education have focused on the integration of technology to enhance learning, and in so doing enabling developers to incorporate design elements for promoting optimal learning experiences tailored to the specific needs, preferences, and abilities of learners. Norman (1998) emphasizes the crucial role of developers in presenting affordances to users, and also the constraints or non-affordances that explicitly communicate the absence of certain opportunities for action. Brown (2015) highlights the rationale for presenting affordances in digital technologies as follows:

Digital technologies have their own design characteristics that determine a particular set of musical possibilities, some that are obvious and others that are less so. As such, technologies, old and new, are never neutral or invisible in the music-making process. (p. 16)

One way to optimize affordances in music education is to eliminate metaphorical design elements in music software interfaces that mimic those of traditional hardware, as these may be confusing or meaningless to beginners who are unfamiliar with their conventions (Bell, 2015). Cheng and Leong (2017) therefore suggested that developers should collaborate with music educators, leveraging their knowledge and experience to enhance the educational quality and affordances of music-learning tools. It is important to note that while affordances can guide the actions of users, they do not determine them. Music educators can also try to identify suitable opportunities to make use of affordances in their teaching. They can do this by considering contextual factors and potential interactions between learners, technology, and the learning-teaching environment.

Conclusion

In this article I have explored the concept of Gibsonian affordances in music education and provided an overview of its variations—namely, cognitive, educational, mental, affective, and social—as applied in music teaching and learning contexts. I summarized the literature on the relationship between learners and their tools for making music, encompassing both traditional musical instruments (as seen in settings such as music classrooms) and digital interfaces. Given the complex and multifaceted development of the concept of affordances, the review is not exhaustive and other approaches to the exploration of the possibilities for objects in music teaching and learning may exist. It is important to recognize that affordances are not fixed or universal; they are contingent upon individual perceptions, cultural contexts, instructional approaches, and technological advancements.

Footnotes

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Lee Cheng

Notes

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Affordances in music education

Abstract

Keywords

Affordances in music and music learning contexts

Cognitive affordances

Educational affordances

Mental affordances

Affective affordances

Social affordances

Practical implications

Conclusion

Footnotes

Funding

ORCID iD

Notes

References