(Dis-)Harmony in movement: effects of musical dissonance on movement timing and form.

Naeem Komeilipoor,Paola Cesari,Cathy M Craig,Matthew W M Rodger

doi:10.1007/s00221-015-4233-9

Naeem Komeilipoor, Paola Cesari + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-015-4233-9

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Abstract

While the origins of consonance and dissonance in terms of acoustics, psychoacoustics and physiology have been debated for centuries, their plausible effects on movement synchronization have largely been ignored. The present study aimed to address this by investigating whether, and if so how, consonant/dissonant pitch intervals affect the spatiotemporal properties of regular reciprocal aiming movements. We compared movements synchronized either to consonant or to dissonant sounds and showed that they were differentially influenced by the degree of consonance of the sound presented. Interestingly, the difference was present after the sound stimulus was removed. In this case, the performance measured after consonant sound exposure was found to be more stable and accurate, with a higher percentage of information/movement coupling (tau coupling) and a higher degree of movement circularity when compared to performance measured after the exposure to dissonant sounds. We infer that the neural resonance representing consonant tones leads to finer perception/action coupling which in turn may help explain the prevailing preference for these types of tones.

Highlights

We interact with our environment through movement; with the way we move being influenced by many different types of perceptual information
Environmental sounds carry an ecological significance that allows us to move in the direction of an object, detect the presence of objects, interact with others and even interpret events using sound alone (Gaver 1993; Carello et al 2005)
Given the absence of a continuous source of external temporal information to guide the action extrinsically, the nervous system must create its own source of dynamic temporal information (Tau-G, Craig et al 2005)

Summary

Introduction

We interact with our environment through movement; with the way we move being influenced by many different types of perceptual information. One of the key ways in which humans naturally interact with their auditory environment is when they synchronize their movements to regular patterns of sound (e.g., dancing to a beat). To be able to synchronize movements to sounds, an activity humans are very skilled at, the nervous system must pick up information from the auditory perceptual stream about the time until the beat sounds and use this information to prospectively guide the generation of consecutive actions (Craig et al 2005). It has already been shown that the structure of sound events (discrete vs continuous) can affect the processes by which movements are timed to sounds, even if the interval durations are the same (Rodger and Craig 2011, 2013). Synchronization of body movement to the perceived musical tempo has been widely studied (see Repp and Su 2013, for a review), the effects of other aspects of auditory stimuli on movement–sound synchronization, such as musical pitch relationships, have largely been neglected

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