Active Drumming Experience Increases Infants' Sensitivity to Audiovisual Synchrony during Observed Drumming Actions

PLoS One. 2015 Jun 25;10(6):e0130960. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0130960. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

In the current study, we examined the role of active experience on sensitivity to multisensory synchrony in six-month-old infants in a musical context. In the first of two experiments, we trained infants to produce a novel multimodal effect (i.e., a drum beat) and assessed the effects of this training, relative to no training, on their later perception of the synchrony between audio and visual presentation of the drumming action. In a second experiment, we then contrasted this active experience with the observation of drumming in order to test whether observation of the audiovisual effect was as effective for sensitivity to multimodal synchrony as active experience. Our results indicated that active experience provided a unique benefit above and beyond observational experience, providing insights on the embodied roots of (early) music perception and cognition.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Acoustic Stimulation
  • Auditory Perception / physiology*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Infant
  • Male
  • Music*
  • Photic Stimulation
  • Psychomotor Performance / physiology*
  • Visual Perception / physiology*

Grants and funding

This work was funded by a Brain-and-Cognition-Excellence-Grant from NWO (433‐09‐253) to SH, an Erasmus Travel Grant to AS, and a British Academy International Partnership & Mobility Scheme (PM120092) to RT.