Influence of Regular Rhythmic Versus Textural Sound Sequences on Semantic and Conceptual Processing

Conceptual priming studies have shown that listening to musical primes triggers semantic activation. The present study further investigated with a free semantic evocation task, 1) how rhythmic vs. textural structures affect the amount of words evoked after a musical sequence, and 2) whether both features also affect the content of the semantic activation. Rhythmic sequences were composed of various percussion sounds with a strong underlying beat and metrical structure. Textural sound sequences consisted of blended timbres and sound sources evolving over time without identifiable pulse. Participants were asked to verbalize the concepts evoked by the musical sequences. We measured the number of words and lemmas produced after having listened to musical sequences of each condition, and we analyzed whether specific concepts were associated with each sequence type. Results showed that more words and lemmas were produced for textural sound sequences than for rhythmic sequences and that some concepts were specifically associated with each musical condition. Our findings suggest that listening to musical excerpts emphasizing different features influences semantic activation in different ways and extent. This might possibly be instantiated via cognitive mechanisms triggered by the acoustic characteristics of the excerpts as well as the perceived emotions.

A Response-Time Approach for Estimating Sensitivity to Auditory Tempo Changes

One of the features of the auditory system is its ability to efficiently process events that occur in rapid succession. The aim of the present study is to propose a new way of investigating sensitivity to auditory tempo changes. More specifically, it proposes to compare the relative sensitivity (bias) to acceleration and deceleration in both musical and monotonal conditions. Bias was measured with (1) a conventional psychophysical method known as the method of constant stimuli (MCS) and (2) a so-called method of dynamic stimuli (MDS). The latter method consists in responding with a finger press as soon as a near-continual tempo change is detected. With the MCS, there was no preference, as estimated by the point of subjective equality, between acceleration and deceleration in the monotonal condition, but there was a preference in the musical condition that indicated more facility for estimating decelerations than accelerations. The results obtained with the MDS are consistent with the MCS results, given that the response time was faster for decelerations than accelerations in the musical condition but not in the monotonal condition. We conclude that the MDS is a sensitive tool for investigating slight tempo variations.