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Expectation and musical perception

The PBS series "Closer to Truth"  did a episode on "How Do Human Brains Experience Music?"
https://youtu.be/1TsitZvvcsw?si=UnTa-wlFnrrFiTnB

in which they explained the complex pathway by which the brain turns perception of sound into recognizable speech or music. Most significantly Prof Elizabeth Margulis of Princeton states that prior knowledge in the brain actually changes what we perceive when listening to music. The whole show is worth watching but at least check out her segment around the 23 minute mark.

What I get from this is that when listening to music the issue of expectation bias is HUGE.  If the brain is expecting something it can open the door to hearing it, and the reverse is also true.

I see relevance here to the many on-going discussions on this forum. What do you think?

Some of you may beinterested in Dr. Margulis books or the work of her Music Cogntion Lab at

 

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Showing 1 response by hilde45

hilde45's avatar
hilde45
4,796 posts
 

"prior knowledge in the brain actually changes what we perceive when listening to music."

My take: What has been called subjectivity is actually objective, and what is objective is experienced as subjective. 

In other words: We can now get rid of the distinction because it has proved too crude. We need other terms.

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