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Re: Absolute pitch discussion
Absolute pitch is a complicated phenomenon. Readers of the auditory list
should not be fooled by the seeming simplicity of the ongoing discussion
of the past few days. I would recommend balancing the nature views
expressed with the interaction of nature and nurture suggested in the
paper by Diana Deutsch and collaborators in JASA last year. The
reference and abstract are pasted in below.
Regards Roy P
Martin Braun wrote:
You mean, why do so few people develop a cognitive version of absolute
pitch? Well, there are many who are waiting for the answer. Just two days
ago there appeared a large-scale survey in PNAS. Perhaps the most
compelling
new result is the clear bimodal distribution of the trait. Either people
have it, or they do not have it, with very little in between. This
indicates
the possibility of a relatively simple genetic origin of the trait, which
means that the answer may not be too far down the road.
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0703868104v1
Absolute pitch among American and Chinese conservatory
students: Prevalence differences, and evidence
for a speech-related critical period (L)a)
Diana Deutschb_
Department of Psychology, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla,
California 92093
Trevor Henthorn
Department of Music, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla,
California 92093
Elizabeth Marvin
Department of Music Theory, Eastman School of Music, Rochester, New York
14604
HongShuai Xu
College of Music, Capital Normal University, Beijing, 10037, China
_Received 12 September 2005; revised 20 November 2005; accepted 21
November 2005_
Absolute pitch is extremely rare in the U.S. and Europe; this rarity has
so far been unexplained. This paper reports a substantial difference in
the prevalence of absolute pitch in two normal populations, in a
large-scale study employing an on-site test, without self-selection from
within the target populations. Music conservatory students in the U.S.
and China were tested. The Chinese subjects spoke the tone language
Mandarin, in which pitch is involved in conveying the meaning of words.
The American subjects were nontone language speakers. The earlier the
age of onset of musical training, the greater the prevalence of absolute
pitch; however, its prevalence was far greater among the Chinese than
the U.S. students for each level of age of onset of musical training.
The findings suggest that the potential for acquiring absolute pitch may
be universal, and may be realized by enabling infants to associate
pitches with verbal labels during the critical period for acquisition of
features of their native language. © 2006 Acoustical Society of America.
_DOI: 10.1121/1.2151799_
PACS number_s_: 43.75.Cd _NHF_ Pages: 719–722
Martin
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Martin Braun
Neuroscience of Music
S-671 95 Klässbol
Sweden
web site: http://w1.570.telia.com/~u57011259/index.htm
----- Original Message ----- From: "Kevin Austin"
<kevin.austin@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <AUDITORY@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, August 29, 2007 9:37 AM
Subject: Absolute pitch development
Thank you. And the question for me follows as to why so few people
develop
absolute pitch if the (mapping) structure exists and is used.
Best
Kevin
--
* ** *** * ** *** * ** *** * ** *** * ** *** *
Roy D. Patterson
Centre for the Neural Basis of Hearing
Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience
University of Cambridge
Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EG
http://www.pdn.cam.ac.uk/cnbh/
phone: +44 (1223) 333819 office
fax: +44 (1223) 333840 department
email rdp1@xxxxxxxxx or
roy.patterson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx