1 00:00:00,060 --> 00:00:02,400 The following content is provided under a Creative 2 00:00:02,400 --> 00:00:03,820 Commons license. 3 00:00:03,820 --> 00:00:06,030 Your support will help MIT OpenCourseWare 4 00:00:06,030 --> 00:00:10,120 continue to offer high quality educational resources for free. 5 00:00:10,120 --> 00:00:12,660 To make a donation, or to view additional materials 6 00:00:12,660 --> 00:00:16,620 from hundreds of MIT courses, visit MIT OpenCourseWare 7 00:00:16,620 --> 00:00:17,580 at ocw.mit.edu. 8 00:00:20,090 --> 00:00:23,490 ABBY NOYCE: So if we're going to talk about music and cognition, 9 00:00:23,490 --> 00:00:27,120 about how we understand music, how we kind of make sense out 10 00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:29,340 of music, we have to back up a step and say, 11 00:00:29,340 --> 00:00:33,870 so what is this music thing? 12 00:00:33,870 --> 00:00:34,620 What is music? 13 00:00:34,620 --> 00:00:37,995 What defines music as opposed to other kinds of sounds? 14 00:00:41,286 --> 00:00:42,270 AUDIENCE: It's catchy. 15 00:00:42,270 --> 00:00:43,270 ABBY NOYCE: It's catchy. 16 00:00:43,270 --> 00:00:43,769 OK. 17 00:00:43,769 --> 00:00:44,800 Some music is catchy. 18 00:00:44,800 --> 00:00:46,341 AUDIENCE: It's a string of notes that 19 00:00:46,341 --> 00:00:47,550 actually sound good together. 20 00:00:47,550 --> 00:00:49,174 ABBY NOYCE: It's a stream of notes that 21 00:00:49,174 --> 00:00:50,790 actually sound good together. 22 00:00:50,790 --> 00:00:55,043 AUDIENCE: Generally, if you're [? in P ?] all of the notes 23 00:00:55,043 --> 00:00:58,480 have a common frequency involved. 24 00:00:58,480 --> 00:00:59,105 ABBY NOYCE: OK. 25 00:00:59,105 --> 00:01:03,186 They're all like multiples of some base harmonic. 26 00:01:03,186 --> 00:01:05,530 AUDIENCE: There's a pattern to the tones. 27 00:01:05,530 --> 00:01:07,744 ABBY NOYCE: There's a pattern to the tones. 28 00:01:07,744 --> 00:01:08,600 Good. 29 00:01:08,600 --> 00:01:09,100 OK. 30 00:01:09,100 --> 00:01:10,450 And if you listened to all of the things 31 00:01:10,450 --> 00:01:12,074 that we have just given as definitions, 32 00:01:12,074 --> 00:01:16,300 you can probably think of some example or another of something 33 00:01:16,300 --> 00:01:19,219 that claims to be music that is not true for these things. 34 00:01:19,219 --> 00:01:21,010 There's certainly music that is not catchy. 35 00:01:21,010 --> 00:01:24,160 There's certainly music that is not based on a harmonic scale. 36 00:01:24,160 --> 00:01:27,460 There's certainly all of these things. 37 00:01:27,460 --> 00:01:28,150 All right. 38 00:01:28,150 --> 00:01:32,980 So we all know that Wikipedia is not an academic reference, 39 00:01:32,980 --> 00:01:39,700 but nonetheless, Wikipedia defines music as an art form. 40 00:01:39,700 --> 00:01:42,930 The medium of which is sound arranged over time. 41 00:01:42,930 --> 00:01:45,100 This is a very broad definition. 42 00:01:45,100 --> 00:01:48,010 You'll notice that none of the things that we discussed 43 00:01:48,010 --> 00:01:49,420 are actually in there. 44 00:01:49,420 --> 00:01:54,640 It's merely this organization of sound over time. 45 00:01:54,640 --> 00:01:57,790 AUDIENCE: So any sound basically would be music? 46 00:01:57,790 --> 00:02:00,110 ABBY NOYCE: That is organized over time by somebody. 47 00:02:00,110 --> 00:02:01,794 AUDIENCE: Oh, [INAUDIBLE] OK. 48 00:02:02,460 --> 00:02:04,585 ABBY NOYCE: Is that a distinction that makes sense? 49 00:02:04,585 --> 00:02:06,500 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] 50 00:02:06,500 --> 00:02:09,617 ABBY NOYCE: So for example, painting, 51 00:02:09,617 --> 00:02:11,950 like the medium is the surface on which you're painting, 52 00:02:11,950 --> 00:02:13,600 and the kinds of pigment and colors, 53 00:02:13,600 --> 00:02:15,160 things that you're using, right? 54 00:02:15,160 --> 00:02:17,370 So Wikipedia says that-- 55 00:02:17,370 --> 00:02:19,750 and I suspect, because this sounds like a very Wikipedia 56 00:02:19,750 --> 00:02:22,880 thing that was argued over in the back channel extensively, 57 00:02:22,880 --> 00:02:25,270 that there was some discussion over how can we 58 00:02:25,270 --> 00:02:27,920 make this definition as inclusive as possible. 59 00:02:27,920 --> 00:02:30,040 So they're saying that the organization of sound 60 00:02:30,040 --> 00:02:30,700 over time. 61 00:02:30,700 --> 00:02:34,600 So somebody has got to arrange the sounds in a certain way. 62 00:02:34,600 --> 00:02:35,873 Thus it becomes music. 63 00:02:35,873 --> 00:02:37,123 AUDIENCE: So like [INAUDIBLE]. 64 00:02:37,123 --> 00:02:38,507 Would that be called music? 65 00:02:38,507 --> 00:02:39,340 ABBY NOYCE: So yeah. 66 00:02:39,340 --> 00:02:41,110 So one of the things that I have a problem 67 00:02:41,110 --> 00:02:42,734 with with this definition is it doesn't 68 00:02:42,734 --> 00:02:46,500 make a distinction between music and, for example, speaking. 69 00:02:46,500 --> 00:02:47,000 Right. 70 00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:49,660 I'm clearly organizing sounds over a period of time 71 00:02:49,660 --> 00:02:51,580 when I'm sitting up here talking. 72 00:02:51,580 --> 00:02:53,330 And I think the general consensus would be 73 00:02:53,330 --> 00:02:55,570 that this is not music, right? 74 00:02:55,570 --> 00:02:57,730 So this is not a perfect definition 75 00:02:57,730 --> 00:02:59,510 in any way, shape, or form. 76 00:02:59,510 --> 00:03:01,960 But it gives us something to start with. 77 00:03:01,960 --> 00:03:10,270 And Wikipedia tells me that the sorts 78 00:03:10,270 --> 00:03:12,220 of aspects of this arrangement of sound 79 00:03:12,220 --> 00:03:16,090 have four key qualities. 80 00:03:16,090 --> 00:03:20,350 So pitch of the sounds as they are arranged. 81 00:03:20,350 --> 00:03:22,510 Rhythm of the sounds. 82 00:03:22,510 --> 00:03:27,930 So things like tempo and meter, all of this. 83 00:03:27,930 --> 00:03:30,370 So we've got pitch, which is like melody, and harmonies, 84 00:03:30,370 --> 00:03:31,245 and things like that. 85 00:03:31,245 --> 00:03:34,330 We've got rhythm and tempo. 86 00:03:34,330 --> 00:03:36,070 The dynamics, the loudness and softness 87 00:03:36,070 --> 00:03:37,552 of different pieces of it. 88 00:03:37,552 --> 00:03:39,010 Who here plays a musical instrument 89 00:03:39,010 --> 00:03:40,880 of one sort or another? 90 00:03:40,880 --> 00:03:41,380 OK. 91 00:03:41,380 --> 00:03:42,540 Everyone except for me. 92 00:03:42,540 --> 00:03:43,680 Woo. 93 00:03:43,680 --> 00:03:45,340 So you guys know all of this stuff. 94 00:03:45,340 --> 00:03:47,440 So changing the dynamics is one of the things that 95 00:03:47,440 --> 00:03:50,260 defines what makes a particular piece of music 96 00:03:50,260 --> 00:03:52,870 sound in its distinctive way. 97 00:03:52,870 --> 00:03:57,190 And finally, and almost kind of at the bottom compared 98 00:03:57,190 --> 00:04:01,170 to all of these others, is the kind of timbre of the sounds 99 00:04:01,170 --> 00:04:02,970 that you can control. 100 00:04:02,970 --> 00:04:05,146 So the things that make a violin playing 101 00:04:05,146 --> 00:04:06,520 an A sound different from a flute 102 00:04:06,520 --> 00:04:08,769 playing an A, sound different from a saxophone playing 103 00:04:08,769 --> 00:04:12,940 an A. So it's all the same pitch, 104 00:04:12,940 --> 00:04:17,290 but the timbre, the sounds of each particular instrument 105 00:04:17,290 --> 00:04:18,464 are very different. 106 00:04:21,310 --> 00:04:25,560 So the other thing I wanted to talk about really quickly 107 00:04:25,560 --> 00:04:27,960 is this idea. 108 00:04:27,960 --> 00:04:30,390 So we all have this kind of sense 109 00:04:30,390 --> 00:04:33,840 that music can convey emotional content. 110 00:04:33,840 --> 00:04:36,100 And we're pretty good with this. 111 00:04:36,100 --> 00:04:37,830 We know what a sad sound sounds like. 112 00:04:37,830 --> 00:04:39,950 We know what a happy song sounds like. 113 00:04:39,950 --> 00:04:42,760 We know what an angry song might sound like. 114 00:04:42,760 --> 00:04:43,704 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] 115 00:04:43,704 --> 00:04:44,370 ABBY NOYCE: Yes. 116 00:04:44,370 --> 00:04:45,540 Thank you. 117 00:04:45,540 --> 00:04:48,426 No wonder we're having difficulties. 118 00:04:48,426 --> 00:04:50,758 [LAUGHTER] 119 00:04:50,772 --> 00:04:51,730 AUDIENCE: Great timing. 120 00:04:56,117 --> 00:04:58,450 ABBY NOYCE: And so there's been a lot of studies showing 121 00:04:58,450 --> 00:05:01,424 that with various kinds of melody instruments 122 00:05:01,424 --> 00:05:02,590 that people are really good. 123 00:05:02,590 --> 00:05:06,490 If you tell a musician to play this and play it so it's sad, 124 00:05:06,490 --> 00:05:09,130 versus play it so it's happy, people 125 00:05:09,130 --> 00:05:14,440 are really good at identifying what emotion the musician was 126 00:05:14,440 --> 00:05:16,870 trying to get across. 127 00:05:16,870 --> 00:05:20,410 And in my hunt for random and interesting musical stuff 128 00:05:20,410 --> 00:05:25,570 today, I found two studies about just how much subtlety 129 00:05:25,570 --> 00:05:29,980 you can get into this idea of conveying information 130 00:05:29,980 --> 00:05:31,870 with music. 131 00:05:31,870 --> 00:05:37,810 And the first one is these guys went down 132 00:05:37,810 --> 00:05:40,890 to just a straight up drum beat rhythm. 133 00:05:40,890 --> 00:05:46,960 This is a study by Laukka and Gabrielsson a few years ago. 134 00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:49,090 And they had professional drummers. 135 00:05:49,090 --> 00:05:52,390 And they had them play a particular rhythm. 136 00:05:52,390 --> 00:05:54,850 And they said, play it so you're happy. 137 00:05:54,850 --> 00:05:56,050 Play it so it sounds sad. 138 00:05:56,050 --> 00:05:58,150 Play it so it sounds angry. 139 00:05:58,150 --> 00:06:00,100 And then they played these same rhythms 140 00:06:00,100 --> 00:06:02,710 for a group of subjects, probably undergrads. 141 00:06:02,710 --> 00:06:05,870 They're at a university. 142 00:06:05,870 --> 00:06:07,990 And they said, rate this. 143 00:06:07,990 --> 00:06:11,740 Rate on a scale of 1 to 10 how happy, how angry, how fearful, 144 00:06:11,740 --> 00:06:12,790 or how sad it is. 145 00:06:15,840 --> 00:06:21,320 So here are some drumbeat clips for you guys to listen to. 146 00:06:21,320 --> 00:06:24,350 Tell me what you think this one is. 147 00:06:24,350 --> 00:06:28,550 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] that'll screw up the feed. 148 00:06:28,550 --> 00:06:31,972 ABBY NOYCE: It shouldn't, because this isn't streaming. 149 00:06:31,972 --> 00:06:34,330 I think it's just an MP3. 150 00:06:34,330 --> 00:06:35,842 AUDIENCE: Are you sure? 151 00:06:35,842 --> 00:06:36,550 ABBY NOYCE: Load. 152 00:06:36,550 --> 00:06:38,995 [DRUMS] 153 00:06:52,700 --> 00:06:55,040 Happy, sad, angry, fearful? 154 00:06:55,040 --> 00:06:56,720 AUDIENCE: Happy. 155 00:06:56,720 --> 00:06:58,370 ABBY NOYCE: Anyone feel otherwise? 156 00:06:58,370 --> 00:06:59,471 AUDIENCE: Happy. 157 00:06:59,471 --> 00:07:00,220 ABBY NOYCE: Happy? 158 00:07:00,220 --> 00:07:01,890 Bum-ba-da-dum. 159 00:07:01,890 --> 00:07:02,390 OK. 160 00:07:02,390 --> 00:07:03,230 So there's one. 161 00:07:08,160 --> 00:07:11,118 [CYMBALS] 162 00:07:14,564 --> 00:07:16,230 ABBY NOYCE: So it's the same base rhythm 163 00:07:16,230 --> 00:07:18,135 being played differently. 164 00:07:32,200 --> 00:07:32,700 All right. 165 00:07:32,700 --> 00:07:34,200 So which emotion is this? 166 00:07:34,200 --> 00:07:35,700 AUDIENCE: That sounds sad or solemn. 167 00:07:35,700 --> 00:07:36,795 AUDIENCE: I'd say solemn. 168 00:07:36,795 --> 00:07:37,840 AUDIENCE: I'm going with sad. 169 00:07:37,840 --> 00:07:38,890 ABBY NOYCE: Solemn or sad. 170 00:07:38,890 --> 00:07:39,890 AUDIENCE: Sad, sad, sad. 171 00:07:44,009 --> 00:07:45,300 ABBY NOYCE: How about this one? 172 00:07:45,300 --> 00:07:47,750 [DRUM BEAT] 173 00:08:07,840 --> 00:08:08,990 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] 174 00:08:08,990 --> 00:08:09,740 ABBY NOYCE: Angry? 175 00:08:09,740 --> 00:08:11,150 AUDIENCE: It sounds happy to me. 176 00:08:11,150 --> 00:08:11,900 ABBY NOYCE: Happy? 177 00:08:11,900 --> 00:08:13,067 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] to me. 178 00:08:13,067 --> 00:08:14,400 ABBY NOYCE: It sounds like what? 179 00:08:14,400 --> 00:08:15,714 AUDIENCE: Like expressive. 180 00:08:15,714 --> 00:08:17,380 AUDIENCE: It sounds [INAUDIBLE] neutral. 181 00:08:17,380 --> 00:08:20,420 ABBY NOYCE: It sounds neutral? 182 00:08:20,420 --> 00:08:22,620 AUDIENCE: Like something to look forward to. 183 00:08:22,620 --> 00:08:26,830 ABBY NOYCE: Like anticipatory sort of? 184 00:08:26,830 --> 00:08:28,062 OK. 185 00:08:28,062 --> 00:08:29,886 AUDIENCE: So it could be fearful. 186 00:08:29,886 --> 00:08:31,274 AUDIENCE: That could be fearful. 187 00:08:31,274 --> 00:08:32,440 ABBY NOYCE: What's this one? 188 00:08:32,440 --> 00:08:34,940 [DRUM BEAT] 189 00:08:43,745 --> 00:08:45,685 [LAUGHTER] 190 00:08:46,655 --> 00:08:48,060 AUDIENCE: I don't know. 191 00:08:48,060 --> 00:08:50,790 AUDIENCE: I think extremely happy or angry. 192 00:08:50,790 --> 00:08:52,087 ABBY NOYCE: Happy or angry? 193 00:08:52,087 --> 00:08:53,420 AUDIENCE: I thought [INAUDIBLE]. 194 00:08:53,420 --> 00:08:54,045 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 195 00:08:54,045 --> 00:08:55,340 ABBY NOYCE: All right. 196 00:08:55,340 --> 00:08:59,150 So let's see what these actually were. 197 00:08:59,150 --> 00:09:01,270 So those were happy, sad, angry, and fearful. 198 00:09:01,270 --> 00:09:02,395 AUDIENCE: That was fearful? 199 00:09:02,395 --> 00:09:03,520 AUDIENCE: That was fearful? 200 00:09:03,520 --> 00:09:08,185 ABBY NOYCE: Interestingly enough, we got the first two. 201 00:09:08,185 --> 00:09:10,310 Like everybody pretty much agreed on the first two. 202 00:09:10,310 --> 00:09:14,580 And then the last two we were a little bit more varied on. 203 00:09:14,580 --> 00:09:17,140 And these guys actually-- 204 00:09:17,140 --> 00:09:17,640 yes. 205 00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:20,270 They threw in here a graph of the data these guys got. 206 00:09:20,270 --> 00:09:25,250 So, again, they had people rate each sample 207 00:09:25,250 --> 00:09:33,140 based on how well they thought it fit a particular emotion. 208 00:09:33,140 --> 00:09:36,470 So when the musician was trying to play happiness, 209 00:09:36,470 --> 00:09:41,440 people rated happy the highest emotion, and others lower. 210 00:09:41,440 --> 00:09:42,519 Likewise for sadness. 211 00:09:42,519 --> 00:09:43,310 Likewise for anger. 212 00:09:43,310 --> 00:09:44,520 Likewise for fear. 213 00:09:44,520 --> 00:09:46,020 So the thing that's interesting here 214 00:09:46,020 --> 00:09:48,710 is that those dark blue bars are the places where 215 00:09:48,710 --> 00:09:51,730 one is actually significantly different from the others 216 00:09:51,730 --> 00:09:54,020 in the statistical sense, so that it's 217 00:09:54,020 --> 00:09:56,420 significantly different. 218 00:09:56,420 --> 00:10:01,700 So fear was rated significantly higher 219 00:10:01,700 --> 00:10:03,140 than all of the other categories. 220 00:10:05,870 --> 00:10:08,720 The fear sample was rated as more fearful 221 00:10:08,720 --> 00:10:10,700 than all of the other categories. 222 00:10:10,700 --> 00:10:16,850 And also then the sample was rated for all 223 00:10:16,850 --> 00:10:18,080 of the other categories. 224 00:10:18,080 --> 00:10:19,580 It was also rated as more fearful 225 00:10:19,580 --> 00:10:21,360 than all of the other samples. 226 00:10:21,360 --> 00:10:23,120 So this is a really solid result. 227 00:10:23,120 --> 00:10:26,540 And it's cool because it's this really minimalist input 228 00:10:26,540 --> 00:10:29,420 that they're using, these really basic samples that are just 229 00:10:29,420 --> 00:10:36,230 basically only varying by tempo and by dynamic versus 230 00:10:36,230 --> 00:10:38,540 like a melodic instrument, which has 231 00:10:38,540 --> 00:10:41,508 a lot more ways of variation. 232 00:10:41,508 --> 00:10:43,424 AUDIENCE: Do you think it could have something 233 00:10:43,424 --> 00:10:45,435 to do with the culture? 234 00:10:45,435 --> 00:10:46,310 ABBY NOYCE: It might. 235 00:10:46,310 --> 00:10:48,268 AUDIENCE: If they expanded the sample to people 236 00:10:48,268 --> 00:10:50,030 from different cultures-- 237 00:10:50,030 --> 00:10:52,250 ABBY NOYCE: Well, so we have a cross-culture here, 238 00:10:52,250 --> 00:10:54,375 because we just did it on a bunch of American kids. 239 00:10:54,375 --> 00:10:56,041 And they did it. 240 00:10:56,041 --> 00:10:56,540 Oopsala. 241 00:10:56,540 --> 00:10:57,530 Where's Oopsala. 242 00:10:57,530 --> 00:11:04,328 I'm guessing somewhere in like Scandinavia, right? 243 00:11:04,328 --> 00:11:05,300 AUDIENCE: Oopsala. 244 00:11:05,300 --> 00:11:06,759 ABBY NOYCE: Anyone know? 245 00:11:06,759 --> 00:11:07,300 I don't know. 246 00:11:07,300 --> 00:11:09,090 My guess is it's like Sweden or somewhere. 247 00:11:09,090 --> 00:11:09,860 AUDIENCE: Google it. 248 00:11:09,860 --> 00:11:10,750 ABBY NOYCE: We can Google it. 249 00:11:10,750 --> 00:11:11,116 AUDIENCE: Google. 250 00:11:11,116 --> 00:11:11,850 Google. 251 00:11:11,850 --> 00:11:13,060 ABBY NOYCE: Where is Oopsala? 252 00:11:16,480 --> 00:11:16,980 Sweden. 253 00:11:16,980 --> 00:11:17,450 AUDIENCE: Sweden! 254 00:11:17,450 --> 00:11:18,400 ABBY NOYCE: All right. 255 00:11:18,400 --> 00:11:21,140 So there's two samples right there. 256 00:11:21,140 --> 00:11:23,650 And you can argue that Northeastern America 257 00:11:23,650 --> 00:11:27,220 and Northwestern Europe are pretty closely 258 00:11:27,220 --> 00:11:28,080 related cultures. 259 00:11:28,080 --> 00:11:30,538 It would be interesting to run it somewhere very different. 260 00:11:34,600 --> 00:11:35,360 OK. 261 00:11:35,360 --> 00:11:36,943 And the other one I wanted to show you 262 00:11:36,943 --> 00:11:38,585 guys is this other really cool study. 263 00:11:38,585 --> 00:11:43,640 And this is a German group that were doing an ERP study. 264 00:11:43,640 --> 00:11:45,800 So they're using an EEG cap with the electrodes 265 00:11:45,800 --> 00:11:48,620 to measure the electrical activity of the brain. 266 00:11:48,620 --> 00:11:50,600 And they're not just going for emotions. 267 00:11:50,600 --> 00:11:53,900 They're trying to see if music can convey some really 268 00:11:53,900 --> 00:11:56,530 kind of sophisticated concepts. 269 00:11:56,530 --> 00:11:58,910 The example they use in their paper is wideness. 270 00:11:58,910 --> 00:12:01,442 Can music convey this idea of wideness. 271 00:12:01,442 --> 00:12:02,900 So what they did is they had people 272 00:12:02,900 --> 00:12:08,570 listen to a sentence, which was either related or unrelated. 273 00:12:08,570 --> 00:12:11,070 And these are translated, since the originals are in German. 274 00:12:11,070 --> 00:12:13,430 So the related sentence would be "The gaze 275 00:12:13,430 --> 00:12:15,200 wandered into the distance." 276 00:12:15,200 --> 00:12:17,210 And the unrelated sentence would be, 277 00:12:17,210 --> 00:12:20,330 "The manacles allow only little movement." 278 00:12:20,330 --> 00:12:23,680 And you can see those are just the sonograms of that, 279 00:12:23,680 --> 00:12:25,470 numbered. 280 00:12:25,470 --> 00:12:28,250 So showing how the sound-- 281 00:12:28,250 --> 00:12:31,510 I think those are just dynamic graphs actually. 282 00:12:31,510 --> 00:12:36,680 Anyway, if you look at the graph on the upper right there, 283 00:12:36,680 --> 00:12:39,080 then you can see the purple line and the blue line 284 00:12:39,080 --> 00:12:45,020 are the EEG measurements of the unrelated prime 285 00:12:45,020 --> 00:12:46,760 and the related prime. 286 00:12:46,760 --> 00:12:48,860 And in particular, you can see that the blue line 287 00:12:48,860 --> 00:12:51,530 and the purple line follow each other exactly for the first 288 00:12:51,530 --> 00:12:53,630 like 300 milliseconds. 289 00:12:53,630 --> 00:12:55,310 And then that N400. 290 00:12:55,310 --> 00:12:59,282 Remember, because negative is up on this graph. 291 00:12:59,282 --> 00:13:01,490 So that spike where it goes back towards the negative 292 00:13:01,490 --> 00:13:05,630 at about 400 milliseconds after the stimulus is different. 293 00:13:05,630 --> 00:13:08,375 It's bigger for the unrelated prime 294 00:13:08,375 --> 00:13:09,500 than for the related prime. 295 00:13:09,500 --> 00:13:11,190 The related prime has a smaller spike. 296 00:13:11,190 --> 00:13:12,940 And so they looked at that, and they said, 297 00:13:12,940 --> 00:13:16,010 OK, what about for music? 298 00:13:16,010 --> 00:13:19,320 And they played two musical samples. 299 00:13:19,320 --> 00:13:23,540 One of which they claim conveys the concept of wildness. 300 00:13:23,540 --> 00:13:26,010 [MUSIC PLAYING] 301 00:13:33,420 --> 00:13:35,410 AUDIENCE: Very Disney. 302 00:13:35,410 --> 00:13:40,665 ABBY NOYCE: And one of which they claim does not. 303 00:13:40,665 --> 00:13:42,790 And you can argue all you like about whether or not 304 00:13:42,790 --> 00:13:43,840 these are good primes. 305 00:13:43,840 --> 00:13:46,295 [MUSIC PLAYING] 306 00:13:46,295 --> 00:13:48,259 [GIGGLING] 307 00:13:56,115 --> 00:13:59,418 AUDIENCE: Accordions. 308 00:13:59,418 --> 00:14:00,043 AUDIENCE: Wait. 309 00:14:00,043 --> 00:14:02,036 People still actually play accordions. 310 00:14:02,036 --> 00:14:02,661 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 311 00:14:02,661 --> 00:14:03,286 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 312 00:14:03,286 --> 00:14:03,787 Obviously. 313 00:14:03,787 --> 00:14:05,744 ABBY NOYCE: And so they found two music samples 314 00:14:05,744 --> 00:14:07,500 that were the same length that didn't show 315 00:14:07,500 --> 00:14:09,597 dramatic dynamic differences. 316 00:14:09,597 --> 00:14:11,430 Although there's definitely patterns in them 317 00:14:11,430 --> 00:14:12,110 that you can see. 318 00:14:12,110 --> 00:14:13,984 This one gets much louder at the end in a way 319 00:14:13,984 --> 00:14:16,314 that the unrelated prime-- 320 00:14:16,314 --> 00:14:17,790 AUDIENCE: She's still talking. 321 00:14:17,790 --> 00:14:20,220 ABBY NOYCE: --doesn't. 322 00:14:20,220 --> 00:14:22,570 And, again, the same thing. 323 00:14:22,570 --> 00:14:28,157 They measured the event revoked event response potential 324 00:14:28,157 --> 00:14:29,490 in response to these two primes. 325 00:14:29,490 --> 00:14:33,780 So if they had people listen to the Strauss piece 326 00:14:33,780 --> 00:14:36,090 and then asked them whether it was related or unrelated 327 00:14:36,090 --> 00:14:38,710 to wideness, then they found, again, 328 00:14:38,710 --> 00:14:42,296 that this N400 is smaller in the related case 329 00:14:42,296 --> 00:14:43,420 than in the unrelated case. 330 00:14:43,420 --> 00:14:44,520 And what's interesting is that that's 331 00:14:44,520 --> 00:14:47,040 the exact same pattern they found for the linguistic prime. 332 00:14:50,700 --> 00:14:52,860 And one of the big confounds in this study 333 00:14:52,860 --> 00:14:56,940 is that they are asking people to consider 334 00:14:56,940 --> 00:15:00,510 whether the prime, whether the sentence or the musical piece, 335 00:15:00,510 --> 00:15:03,340 is or is not related to the concept. 336 00:15:03,340 --> 00:15:05,940 So the difference here could just 337 00:15:05,940 --> 00:15:12,000 be falling out to people's difference in response, 338 00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:14,430 and people's difference in perception 339 00:15:14,430 --> 00:15:17,700 as they judge it after the fact, and not to an actual difference 340 00:15:17,700 --> 00:15:20,720 in seeing this as more wide or less wide, 341 00:15:20,720 --> 00:15:24,930 but having decided that it was more wide or less wide. 342 00:15:24,930 --> 00:15:27,550 So it's not the world's best control study. 343 00:15:27,550 --> 00:15:32,070 But it's nonetheless a really interesting result. 344 00:15:32,070 --> 00:15:33,600 And I'm moderately impressed. 345 00:15:33,600 --> 00:15:35,940 I wouldn't have thought you could pull out 346 00:15:35,940 --> 00:15:39,510 something with that level of semantic content 347 00:15:39,510 --> 00:15:40,650 from a musical sample. 348 00:15:40,650 --> 00:15:44,000 So I thought that was really cool. 349 00:15:44,000 --> 00:15:44,500 Yes. 350 00:15:44,500 --> 00:15:46,541 AUDIENCE: So they asked them to consider wideness 351 00:15:46,541 --> 00:15:47,490 before they listened? 352 00:15:47,490 --> 00:15:50,470 ABBY NOYCE: They played them the sentence, or the sample. 353 00:15:50,470 --> 00:15:53,891 And then they put the word on the screen in front of them 354 00:15:53,891 --> 00:15:56,390 and said, was the thing you just heard related to this word? 355 00:15:56,390 --> 00:15:57,970 Yes or no? 356 00:15:57,970 --> 00:16:00,430 So people didn't have wideness in mind 357 00:16:00,430 --> 00:16:02,920 when they were listening to these things. 358 00:16:02,920 --> 00:16:08,330 I think the timescale on the sample is-- 359 00:16:08,330 --> 00:16:08,830 yeah. 360 00:16:08,830 --> 00:16:11,470 This is measured from when they see the word that they're 361 00:16:11,470 --> 00:16:12,507 asked to judge. 362 00:16:12,507 --> 00:16:14,590 So it's when they're making that judgment decision 363 00:16:14,590 --> 00:16:16,076 about related or unrelated. 364 00:16:16,076 --> 00:16:17,950 And you see this difference whether the thing 365 00:16:17,950 --> 00:16:20,460 that they're considering is a musical prime 366 00:16:20,460 --> 00:16:22,300 or a linguistic prime. 367 00:16:22,300 --> 00:16:27,250 But the difference could be an artifact of the decision making 368 00:16:27,250 --> 00:16:31,432 process, rather than an artifact of the original perception, 369 00:16:31,432 --> 00:16:32,890 which they're kind of fuzzy around. 370 00:16:36,012 --> 00:16:36,970 What do you guys think? 371 00:16:36,970 --> 00:16:38,955 Was the Strauss sample wide? 372 00:16:38,955 --> 00:16:40,787 Do you think it sounded wide? 373 00:16:40,787 --> 00:16:43,370 AUDIENCE: I think if you hadn't mentioned the wideness before, 374 00:16:43,370 --> 00:16:44,750 [INAUDIBLE] 375 00:16:44,750 --> 00:16:46,910 ABBY NOYCE: It would be a better sample? 376 00:16:46,910 --> 00:16:49,360 Yes. 377 00:16:49,360 --> 00:16:50,440 This is probably true. 378 00:16:50,440 --> 00:16:53,010 AUDIENCE: I was practically listening for the wideness. 379 00:16:53,010 --> 00:16:55,600 ABBY NOYCE: Do you think the Strauss sample sounded wider 380 00:16:55,600 --> 00:16:57,070 than the-- 381 00:16:57,070 --> 00:16:58,930 who else was it-- 382 00:16:58,930 --> 00:17:02,130 [INAUDIBLE] sample? 383 00:17:02,130 --> 00:17:03,252 Did it sound wider? 384 00:17:03,252 --> 00:17:05,474 AUDIENCE: Yes. 385 00:17:05,474 --> 00:17:08,015 ABBY NOYCE: Is that because you were expecting it to be wide? 386 00:17:08,015 --> 00:17:11,340 AUDIENCE: It kind of is hard to define wideness. 387 00:17:11,340 --> 00:17:14,190 ABBY NOYCE: Yeah. 388 00:17:14,190 --> 00:17:15,281 Definitely. 389 00:17:18,720 --> 00:17:21,900 How would you define wideness in music, [INAUDIBLE]?? 390 00:17:21,900 --> 00:17:24,652 How would you express wideness in music? 391 00:17:24,652 --> 00:17:27,135 So Strauss does it with this big crescendoing thing. 392 00:17:27,135 --> 00:17:27,760 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 393 00:17:27,760 --> 00:17:29,832 So more dramatic I guess. 394 00:17:29,832 --> 00:17:30,540 ABBY NOYCE: Yeah. 395 00:17:35,798 --> 00:17:36,730 Cool. 396 00:17:36,730 --> 00:17:38,188 AUDIENCE: I think they expressed it 397 00:17:38,188 --> 00:17:40,698 by starting with something that wasn't wide. 398 00:17:40,698 --> 00:17:47,780 So the less voluminous, the less dynamics, 399 00:17:47,780 --> 00:17:51,250 and the less instruments were participating in it. 400 00:17:51,250 --> 00:17:53,578 It's sort of the contrast so that when 401 00:17:53,578 --> 00:17:56,070 you reach the peak of the crescendo you say, wow. 402 00:17:59,465 --> 00:18:01,410 ABBY NOYCE: OK. 403 00:18:01,410 --> 00:18:02,280 Yeah. 404 00:18:02,280 --> 00:18:07,080 So it definitely like expands, like the dynamic range goes up. 405 00:18:07,080 --> 00:18:07,720 I don't know. 406 00:18:07,720 --> 00:18:08,550 Does it make you feel like you're 407 00:18:08,550 --> 00:18:09,780 looking out on an open vista? 408 00:18:09,780 --> 00:18:11,196 If you had to animate, if you were 409 00:18:11,196 --> 00:18:12,687 like doing Fantasia 3 or something 410 00:18:12,687 --> 00:18:15,270 and trying to animate a scene to go with that particular piece 411 00:18:15,270 --> 00:18:18,134 of music, what would you do? 412 00:18:18,134 --> 00:18:19,125 AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] 413 00:18:19,125 --> 00:18:19,750 ABBY NOYCE: No? 414 00:18:19,750 --> 00:18:21,708 Yes? 415 00:18:21,708 --> 00:18:27,054 AUDIENCE: Walking on a dark street with a random guy 416 00:18:27,054 --> 00:18:28,512 playing the accordion. 417 00:18:28,512 --> 00:18:30,456 [LAUGHTER] 418 00:18:30,456 --> 00:18:32,666 ABBY NOYCE: For the second one? 419 00:18:32,666 --> 00:18:34,062 Or for the Strauss. 420 00:18:34,062 --> 00:18:35,360 AUDIENCE: For the second one. 421 00:18:35,360 --> 00:18:35,650 ABBY NOYCE: OK. 422 00:18:35,650 --> 00:18:37,717 AUDIENCE: I was thinking of walking [INAUDIBLE] 423 00:18:37,717 --> 00:18:38,551 [INTERPOSING VOICES] 424 00:18:38,551 --> 00:18:39,175 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 425 00:18:39,175 --> 00:18:39,847 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 426 00:18:39,847 --> 00:18:44,369 I mean, like, if no one else was there except him and you-- 427 00:18:44,369 --> 00:18:44,994 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 428 00:18:44,994 --> 00:18:46,070 And just [INAUDIBLE]. 429 00:18:46,070 --> 00:18:48,110 AUDIENCE: Just walking [INAUDIBLE].. 430 00:18:48,110 --> 00:18:49,400 AUDIENCE: There you go. 431 00:18:49,400 --> 00:18:50,290 AUDIENCE: The first one to be walking [INAUDIBLE].. 432 00:18:50,290 --> 00:18:51,840 ABBY NOYCE: All right.