Citation

Vos PG, Ellermann HH. J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 1989; 15(1): 179-187.

Affiliation

University of Nijmegen, Department of Psychology, The Netherlands.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1989, American Psychological Association)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

2522528

Abstract

In four experiments we investigated the precision and accuracy with which amateur musicians are able to reproduce sequences of tones varied only temporally, so as to have tone and rest durations constant over sequences, and the tempo varied over the musically meaningful range of 5-0.5 tones per second. Experiments 1 and 2 supported the hypothesis of attentional bias toward having the attack moments, rather than the departure moments, precisely times. Experiment 3 corroborated the hypothesis that inaccurate timing of short interattack intervals is manifested in a lengthening of rests, rather than tones, as a result of larger motor activity during the reproduction of rests. Experiment 4 gave some support to the hypothesis that the shortening of long interattack intervals is due to mnemonic constraints affecting the rests rather than the tones. Both theoretical and practical consequences of the various findings, particularly with respect to timing in musical performance, are discussed.

Language: en