Plink: "Thin Slices" of Music Author(S): Carol L
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Plink: "Thin Slices" of Music Author(s): Carol L. Krumhansl Source: Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal, Vol. 27, No. 5 (June 2010), pp. 337-354 Published by: University of California Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/mp.2010.27.5.337 . Accessed: 04/04/2013 18:14 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. University of California Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.84.126.222 on Thu, 4 Apr 2013 18:14:32 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Music2705_01 5/13/10 3:41 PM Page 337 Thin Slices of Music 337 PLINK:“THIN SLICES” OF MUSIC CAROL L. KRUMHANSL presenting listeners with short (300 and 400 ms) clips from Cornell University popular songs. In order to study effects of release date, the songs were taken from the 1960’s through the 2000’s. SHORT CLIPS (300 AND 400 MS), TAKEN FROM POPULAR Listeners were asked to name the artist and title and indi- songs from the 1960’s through the 2000’s, were presented cate their confidence in the identifications. They were to participants in two experiments to study the detail also asked about the decade of release, and judged the and contents of musical memory. For 400 ms clips, par- emotional content and style of the songs. After this, lis- ticipants identified both artist and title on more than teners were presented with long (15 s) clips for ratings 25% of the trials. Very accurate confidence ratings showed of recognition and liking. They also judged these long that this knowledge was recalled consciously. Performance clips for emotional content and style, which can be com- was somewhat higher if the clip contained a word or part- pared with those responses for the short clips as a way word from the title. Even when a clip was not identified, of assessing emotion and style consistency. it conveyed information about emotional content, style These questions about musical memory seem obvious, and, to some extent, decade of release. Performance on but surprisingly little research has been done on them song identification was markedly lower for 300 ms clips, despite the remarkable expansion of psychological although participants still gave consistent emotion and research on music in the last few decades. Perhaps this is style judgments, and fairly accurate judgments of decade because the primary emphasis has been on the cognition of release. The decade of release had no effect on iden- of more abstract properties of musical structure (partic- tification, emotion consistency, or style consistency. ularly scale, harmony, and meter), with many experiments However, older songs were preferred, suggesting that the using materials composed for that purpose and/or pre- availability of recorded music alters the pattern of pref- sented in timbre-neutral sounds (such as piano). As an erences previously assumed to be established during ado- example, take a typical study on whether listeners have lescence and early adulthood. Taken together, the results knowledge of the structure of the major scale. Melodies point to extraordinary abilities to identify music based on would be composed for the experiment that conform to highly reduced information. the scale and the way tones are typically sequenced in a major key. On a trial one melody would be presented, and Received August 3, 2009, accepted January 3, 2010. then a second melody with one or more tones changed Key words: music memory, meta-memory, popular to tones outside the scale. The task is to detect the changed music, emotion, style tone(s) and if it is done correctly (as it would be for both musicians and nonmusicians) it is concluded that listen- ers know the structure of the scale. The findings of a large number of studies demonstrate that these abstract descrip- HE CAR RADIO SCANS FROM STATION TO STATION tors of musical structure are useful not only in the tech- and you recognize a song from decades ago. The nical analysis of music, but that they also function as Ttitle, artist, and lyrics flood into consciousness; cognitive frameworks for perceiving, remembering, and perhaps the album cover, the appearance of the artist, or performing music. Thus, they have cognitive reality. a personal anecdote. Or, if you don’t recognize the song, However, these studies do not bear on the long-term you might immediately recall its era, musical genre, emo- effects of sustained exposure to recorded music, which tional content, how you danced to it, or its social signif- offers a unique opportunity to study human memory. icance. How detailed are these memories? What attributes There were three starting points for this study. The first of songs can be recalled? How is musical memory organ- is the concept of “thin slices” made well known by ized and which attributes are recalled even if the song is Gladwell’s (2005) Blink, from which the title derives. not recognized? And, what is the relationship between Gladwell describes interesting cases in which, despite very musical preferences and other aspects of musical memory? reduced information, experts are able to do such things as These questions were addressed in two experiments by judge authenticity of art, predict double faults in tennis, and Music Perception VOLUME 27, ISSUE 5, PP. 337–354, ISSN 0730-7829, ELECTRONIC ISSN 1533-8312 © 2010 BY THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PLEASE DIRECT ALL REQUESTS FOR PERMISSION TO PHOTOCOPY OR REPRODUCE ARTICLE CONTENT THROUGH THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS’S RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS WEBSITE, HTTP://WWW.UCPRESSJOURNALS.COM/REPRINTINFO.ASP. DOI:10.1525/MP.2010.27.5.337 This content downloaded from 128.84.126.222 on Thu, 4 Apr 2013 18:14:32 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Music2705_01 5/13/10 3:41 PM Page 338 338 Carol L. Krumhansl spot likely customers. These are not cases in which these Perrott downloaded excerpts of songs in 10 genres of “thin slice”judgments are better than judgments with more music (as categorized by the music business), with eight complete information, but cases in which experts have songs per genre. The original segments were 3000 ms in good intuitions, although the basis for them is largely duration, and eight short segments of durations 250, 325, unconsciousness. The name “thin slices,” however, goes 400, and 475 ms were extracted from these; half were back to a review by Ambady & Rosenthal (1992; see also vocal and half purely instrumental. College undergrad- Ambady, Bernieri, & Richeson, 2000). They compiled uates were asked to judge each clip as to which of ten results from 44 studies showing that short exposures of industry-defined genres the song belonged. They also behavior led to fairly accurate assessments along such judged the genre of the 3000 ms clips. They argued that dimensions as trustworthiness, physician proficiency, because genre classification is highly individual, the judg- teacher adequacy, existence of deception, and supervisor ments of the short segments should be compared to the ratings of therapists. Many other studies have been con- listener’s own judgments of the long segments. However, ducted since seeking to determine what kinds of social their judgments could also be compared with the music judgments can be made and on what basis (see, for exam- industry’s classification. ple, Kraus & Keltner, 2009; Pentland, 2008). The question The results were striking. The main measure they pre- here is what kinds of information can be derived from sented was the percent of time a listener’s genre judg- “thin slices”of music (very short clips), particularly when ments for the short segments agreed with their own the clips go unrecognized and the responses are based judgments for the long segments. The percent of self- purely on impressions. agreement was over 40% for the 250 ms segments and The second starting point was a series of well-known increased to over 50% for the 475 ms segments. (The studies on the capacity of visual memory. Nickerson judgments also corresponded to the industry’s classifi- (1965) presented a set of 200 black and white photo- cation 75% of the time, so if they had used the industry graphs subsequent to which pairs of photographs were classifications for comparison the results would still be presented for forced-choice old/new judgments. Shepard’s impressive.) Self-agreement varied considerably across (1967) study used 612 colored pictures of objects. styles from above 70% for classical music to around 20% Standing, Conezio, and Haber (1970) showed 2560 pho- for blues. As they note, this may not accurately represent tographs, and Standing (1973) showed 10,000 pictures. how recognizable the different genres are, but may reflect Recognition accuracy was high in all these studies, even the categories used. For example, classical may be more when the retention interval was as long as a few days and distinguishable than the other nine categories (blues, the presentation time was as short as one minute. country, dance, jazz, Latin, pop, R&B, rap, and rock) Recognition accuracy depended somewhat on these fac- which, as popular music genres, would be expected to tors, but under most conditions accuracy was 90% or overlap more with one another.