This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Nawrot, E. S. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

The Perception of Emotional Expression in Music: Evidence from Infants, Children and Adults

Minnesota State University Moorhead, nawrot{at}mnstate.edu

Two studies investigated the development of the perception of emotion in music. In Study 1, preschool children and adults matched nine pieces of music to five photographed facial expressions (happy, sad, anger, fear and neutral). While children did not agree with the adult majority interpretation for most pieces, their pattern of responding to the music, both with photograph choices and spontaneous verbal labels, was similar to the adults. Important methodological differences between this and previous research could explain the inconsistencies. Study 2 used happy and sad music along with a dynamic visual display in an intermodal matching experiment with 5- to 9-month-old infants. Infants preferred the affectively concordant happy display but did not look longer to the affectively concordant sad display as predicted. Taken together, these results begin to explore how emotional perception from music may be due to innate perceptual predispositions together with learned associations that develop in childhood.

Key Words: development • emotion • infant • intermodal • music • perception

Psychology of Music, Vol. 31, No. 1, 75-92 (2003)
DOI: 10.1177/0305735603031001325


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?