to the loudspeaker when they consider the comparison pattern to be different from
the standard pattern (i.e. response ofdifferent). They continue watching the puppet show
(i.e. no turning response) when they fail to notice the change or if they consider the
change unimportant (i.e. response ofsame). Significantly more responses (turns) to trials
with changes than to those without changes indicate that infants can detect the target
change. Successful detection of such changes also sheds light on infants’ encoding of the
standard melody. For example, infants’ detection of a pitch change in the comparison
melody implies that they noticed the specific pitches or pitch patterning of the original
melody.
Relational processing of pitch and duration
Infants’ perception of frequency,34,35timing,36,37and timbre38,39is finer than that required
for musical purposes. Moreover, perceptual grouping principles that are relevant to
music40,41are operative in infancy. Like adults, infants group isochronous tone sequences
on the basis of similarities in pitch, loudness, and timbre.42,
Infants go well beyond these minimal criteria for music perception. They recognize a
melody in transposition, that is, when its pitch level is shifted upward or downward so long
as the relations between tones are preserved.30,44An analogous situation prevails with
respect to timing. Infants recognize a tone sequence when the tempo is altered so long as the
relative durations remain unchanged.^45 In other words, they can focus on relational attrib-
utes of a melody, transforming a potentially unmanageable feat—encoding the exact pitches
and durations—into a manageable task. Saffran33,46contends that infants preferentially
attend to absolute rather than relative pitch cues in music, but support for her claim is lack-
ing.^47 In principle, infants could retain absolute information along with relational informa-
tion. In fact, infants and adults differentiate instrumental performances heard previously
from subtly different performances of the same melody.^48 On balance, however, relational
information seems to dominate melodic processing in infancy as in adulthood.49,
One relational feature, melodic contour, is especially potent. For example, infants notice
contour similarities and differences when the standard and comparison melodies are
separated by a full 15 s^30 or when distractor tones are inserted between standard and
comparison sequences.^29 Indeed, there are indications that pitch contour is the most salient
musical feature for infant listeners.50,51Pitch contour may also be the most salient feature
of mothers’ speech to prelinguistic infants.52–55In the case of adult listeners, contour
processing seems to be fundamental and relatively impervious to musical experience.^15
During contour-processing tasks, for example, the amplitude and latency of event-related
potentials do not differ for musicians and nonmusicians, in contrast to interval-processing
tasks, where experience-dependent differences are apparent.^56
Interval processing
For adults, the extraction of pitch information is not limited to melodic contour, except for
novel, unconventional melodies.57,58 When adults hear unfamiliar but conventional
melodies (i.e. those that conform to familiar musical conventions), they remember more
detailed pitch information than they would otherwise.59–61In the case of highly familiar
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