A few years ago, when I was President of the Society for Music Perception and Cognition, one of my duties was to give a Presidential Address at the biennial meeting. Traditionally, the president gives some overview of the Society’s business, advertising upcoming initiatives and the like. And then is given leave to discuss any topic … Continue reading Where Are The Older Adults in Music Psychology Research?
From 1-2 November 2019 we were very pleased to host an event entitled Music & Lifetime Memories: An Interdisciplinary Conference. This event featured 20 speakers from 11 countries across the globe (with some travelling from as far as India, China, and Brazil) who gave talks from a variety of disciplinary perspectives (e.g. psychology, musicology, computing, … Continue reading Some Reflections on Music & Lifetime Memories: An Interdisciplinary Conference
Written by Dr. George Athanasopoulos, Dr. Imre Lahdelma & Thomas Magnus Lennie The Workshop-Symposium on Methods in Music and Emotion took place on the 14th of September 2019 at St. Chad’s College, Durham University, United Kingdom. It was a fascinating day for those involved in the field, and a truly wonderful opportunity to get into … Continue reading Comments on a Workshop-Symposium in Methods for Music and Emotion
Fieldwork is the collection of data in a natural environment, usually in person by a single, or a team of researchers. Its aim is to collect data (quantitative, qualitative, ethnographic, etc.) of high ecological validity in a natural location. This does not necessarily mean that it will be an “exotic” location. It can be anywhere … Continue reading A few words on fieldwork research.
On 5-7 August 2019, three of our lab members (Annaliese Micallef Grimaud, Scott Bannister, Kelly Jakubowski) gave talks at the Society for Music and Perception (SMPC) conference in New York City, hosted by New York University. It was a very full programme (156 talks, 164 posters, 7 symposia, 1 keynote), with presentations spanning a broad range … Continue reading SMPC 2019 Conference
One of the ongoing discussion topics in the MSL is recruiting participants. We all carry out traditional lab studies, meeting participants in person in highly controlled circumstances, where we are confident participants can take part in experiments comfortably and without distraction. This practice has been a mainstay of psychological research for decades. However, working in … Continue reading Crowdsourcing in Music Psychology
Our minds are travelling all the time: at work, in class, while commuting, even when making love (Killingsworth & Gilbert, 2010). The urge to escape the present moment is so pressing that many of us decide to invest considerable amount of time and money in training our brains to mindfulness, in the hope of cracking the … Continue reading On the science of mind-wandering and how music can contribute to it
In 1996 the prestigious Nature journal published an intriguing report by Marcel Zentner and Jerome Kagan entitled Perception of Music by Infants. The results suggested that infants prefer consonance (the relative attractiveness of different pitch combinations) over dissonance (the relative unattractiveness of different pitch combinations). The findings brought some much-needed light on the age-old debate regarding the role of … Continue reading Is the Perception of Consonance and Dissonance Universal?
Because my academic background is split essentially 50/50 between music and psychology, I found myself after my PhD not only daunted by trying to navigate the academic job market (as I assume most recent PhD graduates are), but even quite unsure of what type of academic department I wanted to work in. Having completed my … Continue reading On fitting in: Triumphs and challenges of a psychologist in a music department
Last month, the Music & Science Lab held its third Music & Science Symposium; a one-day event at the Music Department at Durham University. The day was jam-packed with interesting talks on diverse topics from researchers, both from Durham University and other Universities. One of the main focuses of this symposium was to be a … Continue reading Music & Science Symposium 2018: Highlights of the Event
Music & Science Lab 