The auditory memory loss of same-different vowel discrimination experiments with a silent delay appear to be asymptotic at about three seconds, whether measured by correct discrimination or by contextual influences of the first vowel on identification of the second. (Author/PN)

Results indicated that significantly more time is needed to perceive tempo increase than tempo decrease, uneven rhythm then even rhythm, and melody alone than melody with accompaniment. Furthermore, significant interaction effects involving beat locations of tempo change suggest that differential groupings may be a factor in tempo discrimination.…

Presents a study which investigated the perception of music majors and nonmusic majors concerning their ability to discriminate the way in which altered musical excerpts differed in pitch or tempo (or both) from preceding presentations. Concludes that both groups responded similarly across conditions and replications, and that tempo changes were…

Three experiments studied the perception of tone sequences. Ratings of perceived structure and ease of recognition in transposition were both influenced by harmonic progression, the contour, and the excursion or repetition pattern within the sequence. Results are described in terms of the abstraction and analysis of levels of pitch relations.…

Examines graduate and undergraduate music majors' ability to detect pitch and rhythm errors in various settings of textually contrasting musical excerpts. Students listened to intentionally marred excerpts and attempted to identify the errors. Analysis of variance revealed that the predictor variables did not function independently of each other.…

Inspection times for both auditory and visual stimuli were correlated with verbal and nonverbal intelligence. Correlations were -.3188 and -.0929 for auditory and visual inspection times with verbal intelligence, and -.2322 and -.2676 with nonverbal intelligence. Results do not support claims that inspection time is closely related to…

In four experiments, evidence was found for a complex psychological representation of musical pitch. The perception of music depends not only on psychoacoustic properties of the tones, but also on processes that relate the tones to one another through contact with a well-defined and complex psychological representation of musical pitch. (Author/RD)

An auditory perception study investigated the ability of 104 Japanese university students, all learners of English as a second language, to distinguish between five English voiceless fricatives in nonsense syllables. Stimuli consisted of 75 tokens presented in consonant-vowel, vowel-consonant-vowel, and vowel-consonant syllables spoken within a…

Two experiments, a shadowing task and a mispronunciation-detection task, were performed to investigate the interactions between the data-driven primary speech perception process and the knowledge-driven word recognition process in the comprehension of continuous speech. Results are applied to an active direct access model of word recognition.…

Three experiments examined the perception of a three-way voicing contrast by monolingual speakers of English. The results demonstrate that the perceptual mechanisms used by adults in categorizing stop consonants can be modified easily with simple laboratory techniques in a short period of time. (Author/PN)

A study explored whether cues given in advance of messages presented through noise were effective for increasing comprehension. Specifically, the study examined whether (1) relevant cues increased overall listening accuracy and (2) irrelevant cues impaired listening by introducing distortions into the processing of messages or simply decreased the…

Discusses the psychophysics of sound localization and the spatial attributes of sound, attempting to explain some of the methods used to produce more realistic sound images. Topics include: direct and indirect sound; localization and sound images; precedence effect; and techniques for creating spaciousness and for sonic image enhancement. (JM)

Describes how the University of Delaware's Grade Units for Interactive Dictation (GUIDO) system is used to improve instructional delivery and educational research in aural skills development. Instruction consists of musical dictation exercises and there are five programs available in two modes--drill-and-practice and heuristic (discovery).…

Describes research in music education at Laval University in which students receive auditory training using a microprocessor-based hardware system. Topics include intervals, chord quality, scale degrees, diatonic tonal functions, rhythmic, melodic and harmonic dictation, jazz chord quality, microtones, and fundamentals. Students maintain full…

Identifies the "missing fundamental illusion" as that which occurs when two tones are heard together and the listener hears a third tone with a pitch corresponding to the difference in their frequencies. Describes an inexpensive and valid demonstration of the missing fundamental using a British police whistle. (MJP)