Academic Journal
Visual processing of musical syntax and its relationship to sight-reading ability.
| Τίτλος: | Visual processing of musical syntax and its relationship to sight-reading ability. |
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| Συγγραφείς: | Lim Y; Cognitive Science Program, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, United States of America., Goldman A; Cognitive Science Program, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, United States of America.; Department of Music Theory, Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, United States of America. |
| Πηγή: | PloS one [PLoS One] 2026 Mar 11; Vol. 21 (3), pp. e0344490. Date of Electronic Publication: 2026 Mar 11 (Print Publication: 2026). |
| Τύπος έκδοσης: | Journal Article |
| Γλώσσα: | English |
| Στοιχεία περιοδικού: | Publisher: Public Library of Science Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 101285081 Publication Model: eCollection Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1932-6203 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 19326203 NLM ISO Abbreviation: PLoS One Subsets: MEDLINE |
| Imprint Name(s): | Original Publication: San Francisco, CA : Public Library of Science |
| Ιατρικοί όροι (MeSH): | Visual Perception*/physiology , Music* , Reading*, Humans ; Female ; Male |
| Περίληψη: | Sight-reading-performing music by reading written notation without prior practice-is a fundamental skill for musicians, yet there is considerable variability in sight-reading ability that technical proficiency alone does not explain. Instead, cognitive mechanisms may explain differences in sight-reading expertise. Prediction of upcoming music is crucial for fluent sight-reading, and these predictions rely on knowledge of harmonic syntax-principles for ordering musical elements. Two research gaps remain: First, no study has directly examined how individual differences in sensitivity to harmonic syntax may relate to sight-reading proficiency. Second, while studies have shown that harmonic syntax can be processed through visual observation of musical actions without sound, it remains unclear whether similar sensitivity emerges during the reading of symbolic musical notation-a context more analogous to sight-reading, and parallel to word reading in language. To address these gaps, 20 skilled pianists completed three tasks: sight-reading, self-paced reading of chord progressions, and an audiation test. Using computational modeling to quantify harmonic predictability, we found that harmonically less predictable chords required significantly longer reading times, providing evidence that visual processing of symbolic music notation exhibits sensitivity to harmonic predictability. However, the degree of this sensitivity showed no significant correlation with sight-reading proficiency or audiation ability, although our sample size may have been too small to detect small interaction effects. Instead, accurate sight-readers showed faster chord reading times regardless of harmonic predictability, suggesting that general visual processing efficiency distinguishes proficient sight-readers. These findings extend prior evidence for visual harmonic processing to the domain of symbolic notation, suggesting that sensitivity to harmonic syntax may operate through written musical symbols without auditory input or motor imitation. Simultaneously, they suggest sight-reading may be a multi-dimensional skill where visual fluency may be more critical than sophisticated syntactic knowledge, suggesting the importance of developing visual processing efficiency for sight-reading expertise. (Copyright: © 2026 Lim, Goldman. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.) |
| Competing Interests: | The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. |
| Entry Date(s): | Date Created: 20260311 Date Completed: 20260710 Latest Revision: 20260710 |
| Update Code: | 20260711 |
| PubMed Central ID: | PMC12978459 |
| DOI: | 10.1371/journal.pone.0344490 |
| PMID: | 41811875 |
| Βάση Δεδομένων: | MEDLINE |
| ISSN: | 1932-6203 |
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| DOI: | 10.1371/journal.pone.0344490 |