Short-term Memory for Musical Intervals: Cognitive Differences for Consonance and Dissonant Pure-Tone Dyads

Rogers SE, Levitin DJ. Short-term Memory for Musical Intervals: Cognitive Differences for Consonance and Dissonant Pure-Tone Dyads. In: AES Convention 123. Audio Engineering Society; 2007. Paper 7172. Available from: https://aes.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=14230

@inproceedings{Rogers2007_14230,
  author = {Rogers, Susan E. and Levitin, Daniel J.},
  title = {{Short-term Memory for Musical Intervals: Cognitive Differences for Consonance and Dissonant Pure-Tone Dyads}},
  booktitle = {AES Convention 123},
  note = {Paper 7172},
  year = {2007},
  month = oct,
  publisher = {Audio Engineering Society},
  url = {https://aes.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=14230}
}

TY  - CPAPER
TI  - Short-term Memory for Musical Intervals: Cognitive Differences for Consonance and Dissonant Pure-Tone Dyads
AU  - Rogers, Susan E.
AU  - Levitin, Daniel J.
T2  - AES Convention 123
M1  - Paper 7172
PY  - 2007
DA  - 2007/10/06
UR  - https://aes.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=14230
PB  - Audio Engineering Society
LA  - en
AB  - To explore the origins of sensory and musical consonance/dissonance, 16 participants performed a short-term memory task by listening to sequentially presented pure-tone dyads. Each dyad was presented twice; during each trial participants judged whether a dyad was novel or familiar. Nonmusicians showed greater recognition of musically dissonant than musically consonant dyads. Musicians recognized all dyads more accurately than predicted. Neither group used sensory distinctiveness as a recognition cue, suggesting that the frequency ratio, rather than the frequency difference between two tones, underlies memory for musical intervals. Participants recognized dyads well beyond the generally understood auditory short-term memory limit of 30 seconds, despite the inability to encode the stimuli for long-term storage.
ER  -