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Circularity in Judgments of Relative Pitch
Abstract
A special set of computer-generated complex tones is shown to lead to a complete breakdown of transitivity in judgments of relative pitch. Indeed, the tones can be represented as equally spaced points around a circle in such a way that the clockwise neighbor of each tone is judged higher in pitch while the counterclockwise neighbor is judged lower in pitch. Diametrically opposed tones—though clearly different in pitch—are quite ambiguous as to the direction of the difference. The results demonstrate the operation of a “proximity principle” for the continuum of frequency and suggest that perceived pitch cannot be adequately represented by a purely rectilinear scale.
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Citations
Cited by
Shepard, R. N. (1984) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037//0033-295x.91.4.417 · Cited by 940
Self-citationScale and contour: Two components of a theory of memory for melodies.
Dowling, W. J. (1978) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037//0033-295x.85.4.341 · Cited by 678
Reaction time and musical expectancy: Priming of chords.
Bharucha, J. J., & Stoeckig, K. (1986) · Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance · doi:10.1037//0096-1523.12.4.403 · Cited by 351
A roadmap for the study of conscious audition and its neural basis
Dykstra, A. R., Cariani, P. A., & Gutschalk, A. (2017) · Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences · doi:10.1098/rstb.2016.0103 · Cited by 61
Highly Accurate Mandarin Tone Classification In The Absence of Pitch Information
Ryant, N., Slaney, M., Liberman, M., Shriberg, E., & Yuan, J. (2014) · Speech Prosody 2014 · doi:10.21437/speechprosody.2014-123 · Cited by 32
Metadata
- Authors
- Shepard, R. N.
- Venue
- The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
- Publisher
- Acoustical Society of America (ASA)
- Published
- 1964-12-01
- Volume
- 36
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 2346-2353
- ISSN
- 0001-4966 (ISSN-L)
- 1520-8524
- OpenAlex
- W2059020775
- Cited by
- 741
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 0.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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