Commonality and variation in mental representations of music revealed by a cross-cultural comparison of rhythm priors in 15 countries

Nori Jacoby (), Rainer Polak, Jessica A. Grahn, Daniel J. Cameron, Kyung Myun Lee, Ricardo Godoy, Eduardo A. Undurraga, Tomás Huanca, Timon Thalwitzer, Noumouké Doumbia, Daniel Goldberg, Elizabeth H. Margulis, Patrick C. M. Wong, Luis Jure, Martín Rocamora, Shinya Fujii, Patrick E. Savage, Jun Ajimi, Rei Konno, Sho Oishi, Kelly Jakubowski, Andre Holzapfel, Esra Mungan, Ece Kaya, Preeti Rao, Mattur A. Rohit, Suvarna Alladi, Bronwyn Tarr, Manuel Anglada-Tort, Peter M. C. Harrison, Malinda J. McPherson, Sophie Dolan, Alex Durango and Josh H. McDermott ()
Additional contact information
Nori Jacoby: Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics
Rainer Polak: University of Oslo, Blindern
Jessica A. Grahn: University of Western Ontario
Daniel J. Cameron: McMaster University
Kyung Myun Lee: Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
Ricardo Godoy: Brandeis University
Eduardo A. Undurraga: Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
Tomás Huanca: Centro Boliviano de Investigación y Desarrollo Socio Integral
Timon Thalwitzer: University of Vienna
Noumouké Doumbia: Université Catholique d’Afrique de l’Ouest
Daniel Goldberg: University of Connecticut
Elizabeth H. Margulis: Princeton University
Patrick C. M. Wong: Chinese University of Hong Kong
Luis Jure: Universidad de la República
Martín Rocamora: School of Engineering, Universidad de la República
Shinya Fujii: Keio University
Patrick E. Savage: Keio University
Jun Ajimi: Tokyo University of the Arts
Rei Konno: Keio University
Sho Oishi: Keio University
Kelly Jakubowski: Durham University
Andre Holzapfel: KTH Royal Institute of Technology
Esra Mungan: Bogazici University
Ece Kaya: Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics
Preeti Rao: Indian Institute of Technology Bombay
Mattur A. Rohit: Indian Institute of Technology Bombay
Suvarna Alladi: Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences
Bronwyn Tarr: University of Oxford
Manuel Anglada-Tort: Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics
Peter M. C. Harrison: Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics
Malinda J. McPherson: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Sophie Dolan: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Alex Durango: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Josh H. McDermott: University of Cambridge

Nature Human Behaviour, 2024, vol. 8, issue 5, 846-877

Abstract: Abstract Music is present in every known society but varies from place to place. What, if anything, is universal to music cognition? We measured a signature of mental representations of rhythm in 39 participant groups in 15 countries, spanning urban societies and Indigenous populations. Listeners reproduced random ‘seed’ rhythms; their reproductions were fed back as the stimulus (as in the game of ‘telephone’), such that their biases (the prior) could be estimated from the distribution of reproductions. Every tested group showed a sparse prior with peaks at integer-ratio rhythms. However, the importance of different integer ratios varied across groups, often reflecting local musical practices. Our results suggest a common feature of music cognition: discrete rhythm ‘categories’ at small-integer ratios. These discrete representations plausibly stabilize musical systems in the face of cultural transmission but interact with culture-specific traditions to yield the diversity that is evident when mental representations are probed across many cultures.

Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1038/s41562-023-01800-9

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