Studies on the discrimination and the memory of the musical scale

In consequence of the progress of the modern psychology and in compliance with the social demand since the world war, the study of the mental test has become remarkably progressive. However, the study has been limitted to a deffinite aspect of the characteristic faculty. The estimation of the musical capability has been neglected and the experiments on the consonance test which were untertaken by Seashore, Malmberg, Gaw and Heinlein have thrown a beam of light to the darkness of this line. The present author introduced a new method of estimation for the musical capability and examined the children in a primary school as to their ability of discrimination and of memory for musical scale. A reed organ with a keyboard of the pitch arrangement from F(1) (number of vibrations 44 per second) up to f(3) (number of vibrations 1408 per second) was used as the instrument for the examination. The children's capability of the differentiating perception for a note of semi pitch in a second's duration and interval of the impulse was examined and then, the correctness of the memory for a series of tones which is composed of 3 or 4 different pitches of notes was examined under a second's impulse duration and a second's impulse interval. The results of the examination were compared with the grade marks of the singing, the arithmetics and the other curricula of a primary school on the part of the individual examined and the following conclusion was drawn. 1) The capability of the differential perception and the memory for a series of tones in the middle pitch section of a reed organ is generally good, but it is not good in the treble section and the bass section. 2) Those well developed in the differential perception of a series of tones are generally well developed in the memory of it. However, it is not always the case that those well developed in the memory of a series of tones are well developed in the differential perception of it. 3) Those who are excellent in the capability of the differential perception and the memory for a series of tones show an excellent grade mark for such curricula as the singing, the calculation and the memory of numbers, and the arithmetics especially, the calculation on the abucus. 4) The memory for a shape (for example, for a drowing) does not accord with the memory for the musical scale. 5) Correlative value between the capability of the memory for the musical scale with the grade mark of the singing, with that of the calculation on the abacus, with the capability of the memory for numbers, with the grade mark for the arithmetics and with that for the drawing shows 0.93, 0.82, 0, 83, 0.7, 0.46, respectively. 6) There is no remarkable difference between the male and the female sex as far as the capability of the discrimination and the memory for the musical scale are concerned. 7) The method of examining the discrimination and the memory for the musical scale by means of an organ might be highly recommended as a method for estimating the musical talent, the memory of numbers and the ability of calculation, because there is no means of the preparation for the problems of the examination on the part of the examinee.

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