amusia and tone perception

[Jonathan Pearl]

Dear Colleagues:

	I was pleased to find Ping Li's message and Isabelle Peretz'
reply while searching the CHILDES archive. I have now joined the list,
and wish to add my comment. I have an annotated bibliography of relevant
research posted at http://www.music.ucsb.edu/projects/cism/SSB.pdf. I
draw your attention in particular to items 30, 32, and 39, which deal
with cases not of amusia but aprosodia in tone-language speakers. A
disconnect is noted between lexical tone and affective tone, which
complicates the situation a bit. It is quite possible as well that a
native tone-language speaker might acquire amusia without apparent
deficit to lexical tone. The common assumption is that musical melody is
more akin to affective prosody (though this relationship needs more
fleshing out).

	What becomes increasingly apparent is that the function to which
we put a cognitive process (such as pitch or melodic contour perception)
is the crucial element rather than the sorts of information being
processed. The degree to which certain elements of vocal sound
production are foregrounded or backgrounded (i.e. automatized) has a lot
to do with functioning under cognitive damage or stress. Otherwise, we
might wonder why there are not separate cochlea for music and language,
since they seem to utilize the same basic elements but in different
ways, and neurological evidence suggests that they may break down
independently (cf. Patel, et al. 1998. "Processing prosodic and musical
patterns: a neuropsychological investigation." Brain and Language 61:
123-144.) The relationship between singing and speech prosody is a
fascinating area of research, and one about which little is currently
known. How does an infant, exposed to both speaking and singing, acquire
the distinction between music and language that we find so self-evident
as adults?

Enjoy,

Jonathan

_____________________________________________
JONATHAN G SECORA PEARL
PhD Student, Musicology, Department of Music
Assistant Director, Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Music
University of California, Santa Barbara
email: jpearl at umail.ucsb.edu
homepage: http://uweb.ucsb.edu/~jpearl