tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26741618.post1281178943624221918..comments2024-02-28T02:22:20.886-08:00Comments on homunculus: Appearances matter most in musical performancePhilip Ballhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09986655706443117158noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26741618.post-72843812818345044422013-08-25T10:52:56.505-07:002013-08-25T10:52:56.505-07:00Music is a holistic experience, but be aware/ bewa...Music is a holistic experience, but be aware/ beware of bias. Orchestras now conduct blind auditions because of a series of studies indicated systematic gender bias during the audition process. <br /><br />See, e.g. Published: Goldin, Claudia and Cecilia Rouse. "Orchestrating Impartiality: The Impact Of 'Blind' Auditions On Female Musicians," American Economic Review, 2000, v90(4,Sep), 715-741.MineralPhyshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04484992345043279641noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26741618.post-78518667246698516542013-08-22T13:25:27.060-07:002013-08-22T13:25:27.060-07:00Thank you Aaron and Chris. I had missed that story...Thank you Aaron and Chris. I had missed that story about Joshua Bell - a very nice analogy. And yes Chris, this issue of how the winners were judged in the competitions themselves is an important one that I should have brought up but didn't. It's actually quite complicated, and shows that there's still work to be done to iron out just what is going on here. This is what Chia-Jung Tsay has said to me:<br />"This area needs further investigation in future work, but data from my ongoing research suggest that when placed under cognitive load (memorize and recall a 7-digit number, count back from 2000 in 7's, etc.), participants in the video-plus-sound condition – for the first time – identify the winners at rates significantly above chance. In natural evaluation settings such as music competitions, perhaps a visual primacy emerges as our attention is exhausted and we become less able to focus on using sound as the primary information. The ongoing research is suggestive that we may revert to a dependence on visual information when overwhelmed with information, such as when judges are confronted with hours of repertoire per contestant. On the other hand, our conscious recognition of the importance of sound may guide our attention towards sound when we face more manageable sets of information. It may be that the limited experimental evaluation setting allowed people to focus on sound, which ironically led to decreased rates of identifying the winner, perhaps because the availability of sound led people away from the original (visually-based) decisions."<br />Philip Ballhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09986655706443117158noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26741618.post-54883423397321921182013-08-21T03:03:43.845-07:002013-08-21T03:03:43.845-07:00A very provocative study.
The thing I couldn'...A very provocative study. <br /><br />The thing I couldn't find in the methods is how the original competitions had been judged. I take part in Brass Band competitions and in these the judges are traditionally screened from the bands so that they get no visual cues. <br /><br />I might have been interesting to see not just how well the study groups were at identifying the actual winner of the contests but also how internally consistent their answers were.<br /><br />I'm just a little worried that this result is due to there being a greater spread in the 'visual' aspects of the performances than in the 'audible' aspects as these are finalists in top flight music competitions.<br /><br />Though I'm not sure how to control for differences in the stimuli, compared to differences in the perception of the stimuli. If in deed those can even be said to be different things.<br /><br />Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07282445929874441787noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26741618.post-70490692083055154872013-08-20T22:25:29.026-07:002013-08-20T22:25:29.026-07:00Thanks for the great summary! Of course, music is ...Thanks for the great summary! Of course, music is a holistic experience. There is <i>so</i> much baggage. There is very little to audio alone. Consider the studies now classic example of Joshua Bell playing in the subway and nobody thinks he's as marvellous then.<br /><br />I wrote a summary last year of how I see music's context. There's no escaping all the levels of influence. For those curious: http://blog.wolftune.com/2012/09/framework.htmlAaron Wolfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com