Abstract
We review the literature on infants' perception of pitch and temporal
patterns, relating it to comparable research with human adult and
non-human listeners. Although there are parallels in relative pitch
processing across age and species, there are notable differences.
Infants accomplish such tasks with ease, but non-human listeners
require extensive training to achieve very modest levels of performance.
In general, human listeners process auditory sequences in a holistic
manner, and non-human listeners focus on absolute aspects of individual
tones. Temporal grouping processes and categorization on the basis
of rhythm are evident in non-human listeners and in human infants
and adults. Although synchronization to sound patterns is thought
to be uniquely human, tapping to music, synchronous firefly flashing,
and other cyclic behaviors can be described by similar mathematical
principles. We conclude that infants' music perception skills are
a product of general perceptual mechanisms that are neither music-
nor species-specific. Along with general-purpose mechanisms for the
perceptual foundations of music, we suggest unique motivational mechanisms
that can account for the perpetuation of musical behavior in all
human societies.
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