title: The appropriate or optimal tempo for music: a comparison between non-musicians and musicians.
abstract: Musicians have enhanced skills that result from intensive training. Whilst musicians show enhanced auditory capabilities (Kraus and Chandrasekaran, 2010 Nature Reviews Neuroscience 11 599-605), non-musicians demonstrate an ability to perform musical tasks (eg listening, dancing, and singing). Non-musicians can also undertake tasks that would normally be reserved for musicians. For example, non-musicians can perceive optimal tempi (ie an appropriate speed) for music (Quinn and Watt, 2006 Perception 35 267-280; Quinn and Watt, 2012 Perception 41 236-238; Quinn et al, 2012 Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 131 3595-3598). This suggests that formalised musical training is not a prerequisite for developing a sense of the tempo that sounds right for a melody. The current studies examine this issue and compare the tempo that musicians choose to perform unfamiliar melodies with the tempo that non-musicians perceive to be optimal for the same melodies. The results demonstrate that the perceived optimal tempo is similar to the performed tempo.
authors.affiliation: Division of Psychology, School of Natural Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK. s_quinn08@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Quinn
authors.affiliation: Division of Psychology, School of Natural Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK.
authors.forename: Roger
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Watt
mesh_terms: D001076:Aptitude; D001307:Auditory Perception; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D009146:Music / Q000523:psychology*; D011214:Practice, Psychological; D013998:Time Perception