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Frequency ratios and the perception of tone patterns
1Department of Psychology, University of Windsor, N9B 3P4, Windsor, Ontario, Canada.
Psychonomic Bulletin & Review
|November 9, 2013
Summary
Simple frequency ratios explain how people perceive musical tones. This applies to judgments of consonance, dissonance, similarity, and pattern discrimination for both musical and non-musical listeners.
Area of Science:
- Auditory perception
- Psychoacoustics
- Music cognition
Background:
- Previous research suggests simple frequency ratios in tones influence auditory perception.
- The precise role of frequency ratio simplicity across various auditory tasks remains to be fully elucidated.
Purpose of the Study:
- To quantify the perceptual simplicity of frequency ratios.
- To reanalyze existing data on tone perception to assess the impact of frequency ratio simplicity.
Main Methods:
- Quantification of frequency ratio simplicity.
- Reanalysis of data from multiple studies on simultaneous and sequential tone perception.
Main Results:
- Frequency ratio simplicity significantly predicted judgments of consonance and dissonance.
- Simplicity of frequency ratios also accounted for perceived similarity across diverse tasks and listener groups.
- It explained the ease of discriminating tone patterns for both musically experienced and inexperienced individuals.
Conclusions:
- The simplicity of frequency ratios is a general factor influencing auditory perception.
- Perceptual processing advantages are conferred by simple frequency ratios in tone pairs.
- These findings support the broad applicability of ratio simplicity in explaining auditory judgments and discriminations.
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