DEVELOPMENTAL CHANGES IN AUDITORY TEMPO SENSITIVITY AND PREFERRED TEMPO

by Mercier, Ann Mary

The study examined the relationship between developmental changes in preferred motor tempo (PMT) and tempo sensitivity (TS) to test McAuley, Jones, Holub, Johnston, & Miller (2006) preferred period and entrainment region hypotheses. Four groups of listeners (4-5, 6-7,8-9, and 18+ years) were asked to tap to their preferred rate and make judgments about the relative tempo of standard-comparison isochronous tone sequence pairs. Findings related to preferred period hypothesis were mixed; age-related changes consistent with the hypothesis were observed in PMT but there was no age-related shift in TS. TS findings were consistent with entrainment region hypothesis; TS improved with age except in the youngest age group, with greatest age-related improvements observed at the slowest tempo. Improvements in TS associated with increasing number of comparison intervals were generally consistent with Miller & McAuley (2005) but amount of improvement varied with age and tempo.