Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

Samples of 24 and 12 college music majors were given tests of interval recognition and pitch recognition to investigate specific context effects. Absolute-pitch individuals were excluded. Conditions were: (1) single tones (pitch recognition), (2) isolated as cending intervals terminating in the same tones, (3) the same intervals, preceded by a distractor tone, and (4) the same intervals followed by a distractor tone. Conditions 3a and 4a were also run, with the distance of the distractor tone from its adjacent tone changed from a major third to a minor third. Recognition of the minor third, tritone, and minor and major sixths was enhanced by condition 4, as compared with the control condition 2. In condition 3 incorrect responses overestimated the targets, whereas in condition 4 targets were underestimated. There was no evidence that pitch recognition ability in nonabsolute pitch subjects aids interval recognition.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Buttram, J. B. The influence of selected factors on interval identification. (Unpublished doctoral dissertaion, University of Kansas, 1967).

Cohen, A. J. Perception of tone sequences from the Western-European chromatic scale: Tonality, transposition and the pitch set. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Queen' s University at Kingston, Canada, 1975.)

Deutsch, D. , & Roll, P. L. Error patterns in delayed pitch comparison as a function of relational context. Journal of Experimental Psychology. 1974, 103, 1027–1034.

Dwar, K. , Cuddy, L. , & Mewhort, D. J. K. Recognition memory for single tones with and without context. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory. 1977, 3, 60–67.

Jeffries, T. B. A further investigation of certain learning aspects in the aural recognition of melodic intervals. Journal of Research in Music Education, 1970, 18, 399–406.

Johnson, M. S. A comparison of tonic orientation versus isolated interval approach to teaching pitch relations (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, The Catholic University of America, 1977).

Killam, R. N. , Lorton, P. V. , & Schubert, E. D. Interval recognition: Identification of harmonic and melodic intervals. Journal of Music Theory. 1975, 19, 212–233.

Koester, T. , & Schoenfeld, W. N. The effect of context upon judgments of pitch differences. Journal of Experimental Psychology. 1946, 36, 417–430.

Leonard, N., Jr. The effect of certain intrinsic and contextual characteristics of the tone stimulus on pitch discrimination. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, West Virginia University, 1967).

10.

Long, P. A. Pitch recognition in short melodies. Journal of Research in Music Education. 1977, 25, 272–282.

11.

Marquis, J. H. A study of interval problems in sightsinging performance with consideration of the effects of context. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Iowa, 1963).

12.

Mull, H. K. The acquisition of absolute pitch. American Journal of Psychology. 1925, 26, 469–493.

13.

Oakes, W. F. An experimental study of pitch naming and pitch discrimination. Journal of Genetic Psychology. 1955, 86, 237–256.

14.

Ortmann, O. On the melodic relativity of tones. Psychological Monographs, 1926, 35, Whole No. 162.

15.

Rimm, D. C. The effect of context on tonal memory. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Stanford University, 1965).

16.

Siegel, J. A. , & Siegel, W. Absolute identification of notes and intervals by musicians. Perception and Psycophysics. 1977, 21, 143–152.

17.

Taylor, J. A. Perception of melodic intervals within melodic context. (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Washington, 1972).

18.

Ward, W. D. Absolute pitch. Sound. 1963, 2, 14–21.

Interval and Pitch Recognition in and out of Immediate Context

Abstract

Get full access to this article

References