ABSTRACT
In Chapter 8, we learned that it is possible to reduce, with a training lasting 60 to 90 minutes, the variability of nonmusicians in a task involving continuous production of short time intervals (Madison, Karampela, Ullén, & Holm, 2013). However, the authors of this study report that the level of production after such training is comparable to that achieved by musicians in other studies using a similar method. Part of the difference between musicians and nonmusicians observed in some studies of temporal judgments may not be due to long musical training. Nevertheless, there are many studies that provide strong support for the idea that musicians are better than other people when performing a task requiring skills for processing temporal information. Moreover, the fact that a classical test for assessing musical aptitude, the Seashore Measures of Musical Talents (Seashore, Lewis, & Saetveit, 1956), includes elements specific to duration, is certainly indicative of the importance given to temporal processing in music. In addition to assessing the ability to distinguish tone, timbre and loudness, the Seashore allows you to evaluate tonal memory and, above all, sensitivity to rhythm and duration.
