AGING IN PERCEPTION AND COGNITION OF MUSIC

音乐提供了一个理想的领域来测试广泛接受的 认知老化的原理，并探讨专业知识的因素如何 可以调节认知的年龄差异。 我们提出了12项研究， 研究年龄和音乐训练与感知和记忆的关系 与伶 我们的第一个具体目标是检验一个人的 音阶和其他音乐结构的知识不会下降， 尽管在线分析中存在与年龄相关的缺陷， 与伶 我们将在五项不同的研究中检验这一假设， 评估音调结构对（a）感知相似性的影响 单音调和音调序列，和（B）短期记忆的准确性， 旋律，由年轻人和老年人与不同水平的音乐 训练 我们的第二个具体目标是确定 老年人的普遍放缓延伸到音乐材料，如果是这样，如果 这种放慢在专业音乐家中减少。 避免使用 响应时间的措施，我们的做法将是确定最快的， 最慢的节奏，在旋律可以识别，并评估 在不同节奏下呈现的旋律中音高编码的准确性。 我们 第三个具体目标是在几个方面研究年龄差异， 记忆旋律，包括在短期内保持旋律， “工作”记忆，旋律的识别，背景的回忆， 事先遇到的旋律，和现实监测 判决 熟悉的旋律是否是最近才感知到的，或者仅仅是想象出来的。 我们还将检验年龄差异最小的原则， “启动”任务揭示了刺激的记忆，即使在没有 有意识的回忆 在整个拟议的研究中， 年龄与专业知识的可能相互作用，而且，在其他情况下， 这些变量的分离效应。

Music provides an ideal domain to test the generality of widely accepted principles of cognitive aging, and to explore how the factor of expertise can moderate age differences in cognition. We propose 12 studies that will examine how age and musical training are related to perception and memory of music. Our first specific aim is to examine the hypothesis that one's knowledge of scales and other musical structures does not decline and may even increase in old age, despite age-related deficits in on-line analysis of music. We will test this hypothesis in five different studies that assess the effects of tonal structure on (a) the perceived similarity of single tones and tone sequences, and (b) accuracy of short-term memory for melodies, by young and elderly adults with different levels of musical training. Our second specific aim is to determine if the principle of generalized slowing in old age extends to musical materials, and, if so, if this slowing is reduced among expert musicians. Avoiding the use of response-time measures, our approach will be to determine the fastest and slowest tempos at which melodies can be recognized, and to assess the accuracy of pitch-encoding in melodies presented at varying tempos. Our third specific aim is to examine age differences in several aspects of memory for melodies, including the maintenance of melodies in short-term or "working" memory, recognition of melodies, recollection of context of prior encounter with melodies, and reality-monitoring judgments of whether familiar melodies have been recently perceived or simply imagined. We will also test the principle that there are minimal age differences in "priming" tasks revealing memory for stimuli even in the absence of conscious recollection. Of interest throughout the proposed research will be possible interactions of age with expertise, and, in other cases, dissociative effects of these variables.