Music Preference Flashcards
What has a broad amount of research concluded about music preference?
Preferences largely reflect personality, self concept & social reality; listening can also shape attitudes & the causal direction is two-way
Describe some factors that influence music preference
Personal & social factors: training, repetition, age, cultural identity, personality, brain processing, learning styles, emotional factors
What are the two main philosophical perspectives in regards to music preference?
Referentialist (aka emotivists or arousalists) & Expressionist (aka cognitivists)
Describe the Referentialist view;
Describe the Expressionist view;
Which view has been more dominant?
The listener determines the feelings in the music; the music evokes the emotion (internal emotional locus);
The meaning of the music is inherent within the piece; the music expresses the emotion (external emotional locus);
Expressionist
Thompson & Robitalle (1992) wanted to know to what extent can composers communicate specific emotions to listeners. Describe their research & results
5 musicians composed short melodies to convey six emotions: joy, sorrow, excitement, dullness, anger & peace; these were played through a sequencer to 14 subjects; all successfully recognised the intended emotion in each piece
What 5 categories did Bonneville-Roussy (2013) find which make up the acronym, MUSIC, & correspond to patterns of preference across age trends?
Mellow; Unpretentious, Sophisticated; Intense; Contemporary
Describe the following genres across age trends & the processes involved: Intense; Contemporary; Mellow; Sophisticated; Unpretentious
Adolescence - establishing identity, quest for independence; punk, metal;
Early adulthood - gaining acceptance from others; pop, rap
Adulthood - finding love & being loved; romantic, emotionally positive, danceable;
Middle age - high culture aesthetic linked to social status & perceived intellect; jazz, classical;
Onward - family, love, grief & loss; blues, country, folk
What are Reminiscence Bumps & Cascading Reminiscence Bumps?
Songs popular in our formative years (early 20’s) seem to have the greatest lasting emotional impact (reminiscence bumps) & music from our parents’ generation also shapes autobiographical memories, preferences & emotional responses (cascading)
How did the study by Krumhansi (2013) support the phenomenon of Reminiscence Bumps?;
As well as the resulting memory & cascading memory bumps, what else did they find?
62 college students listened to hits from 1955 to 2009 & were asked: which periods of music were more memorable; which songs conjured up the strongest memories; which made them happy, sad, energised or nostalgic;
Associated memories increased with age
When Morrison (1998) compared the musical preferences of 469 white & African-American students in grades 6, 7 & 8 where they responded to 10 instrumental music excerpts, what was presented?;
What did white subjects prefer?;
What did African-American subjects prefer?
5 by white jazz artists & 5 by African-American artists; presented as music only; music accompanied by photo of performers; or music with photo representing a different ethnicity;
Excerpts by white performers regardless;
Music by white musicians in music alone condition; music believed to be by African-Americans (visual cues)
Juslin & Sloboda (2010) found a link between music & personality. What type of music do high sensation types prefer?;
Extroverts?;
Open-minded?;
Highly intellectual people?
Intense music (need for physiological sensation); Sociable & energetic (need to interact in a social manner with positive affect); Variety of creative styles (need to experience new things); Complex music (need for cognitive stimulation)
What results did Chamorro-Premuzic and Furnham (2007) find when asking if traits can explain how people use music?
When the listener focused more on the content of the song it was positively related to neuroticism; Openness, intellect & IQ were related to cognitive stimulation (focus on musical structure)
What are music empathisers?;
What are music sympathisers?
Those who like to work with people & are interested in the mood of a piece;
Those who like to work with objects & are generally preoccupied with the structure of the music
Dunn et al. (2012) studied how reported musical preferences related to actual listening behaviour in the workplace. What did they find about listening behaviour?;
What positive correlations were found regarding personality?;
When considering both reported preferences & listening behaviours, what correlations were consistent?
People listened to the types of genre they reported liking;
Extraversion with pop, dance, rock & religious music; agreeableness with soundtracks;
Neuroticism with classical music; openness to experience with jazz
Instead of esoteric labels, what did Dunn et al. use in their study?;
What are some issues with these?;
Genre labels (i.e. rhythm & blues, hard rock, bass heavy, country, soft rock, classical); May be too unstable (genres are evolving, overlapping & ambiguous); music is constantly changing
According to Gans, what do Taste Public subscribe to?;
What is music taste culture set by?
Taste culture (those belonging to a group share a musical taste); Shared values
What do social influences on taste public include?
Socialisation (family, peers, values, training); Identification & cohesion (class, culture, ethnic group); Peer influence (individuation); Media (radio, TV, social media)
What does the Interactionist Theory suggest?
People seek musical environments that reinforce & reflect personalities, attitudes & emotions
Russell found links between music preference & individual factors. Among what groups is Classical music most common?;
Popular music?;
Progressive?
Higher socio-economic groups (minority among social classes);
Lower socio-economic groups;
Teenagers & young adults
Musical tastes formed in youth persist as we get older. What did Le Blanc et al. find about open-earedness & listener tolerance?
Younger children are more open-eared; this declines in adolescence, rebounds at young adulthood, & declines as we enter old age
Schwartz & Fouts examined the personality characteristics & developmental issues of 3 groups of adolescent music listeners. What was a preference for heavy music associated with?;
Those who preferred light music?;
Those with eclectic tastes?
Family conflict over independence issues, feeling rejected & misunderstood, & problems with intellectual pursuits;
Had concerns regarding sexuality & relationships;
Had less difficulty negotiating their adolescence
What music do women tend to prefer over men?;
What factor regarding exposure influences our liking of music?
Light/popular music & are more likely to respond in an emotional way; no difference re heavy music;
Familiarity
North & Hargreaves allocated 393 students to one of 17 music situations, & had them rate various music characteristics in regard to that situation. What were the results?;
What does this suggest?
The greater the similarity between emotional connotations of 2 situations (e.g. high vs. low arousal), the greater the similarity between the music they’d like to hear in that situation;
We choose music that compliments the emotional qualities of a situation
