Page 8 - ELG2111 Nov Issue 478

RESEARCH NEWS .

Language can be music to the ears

You don’t have to be musical to find melody in spoken words

By Gillian Ragsdale

Whether or not they have musical
ability, students who rate a new
language as sounding melodic are
better able to speak it, according
to a study by researchers in PHOTO BY OMAR MEDINA FILMS FROM PIXABAY
Austria, Latvia and Germany.
Both language and music are
characterised by changes in tone
and rhythm, and the link between
music and language is regularly
exploited in the classroom,
for example, by learning new
vocabulary via singing. Previous
research has tested whether
common abilities underpin
progress in both subjects, but
Christiner et al wanted to know
whether the listener’s subjective
perception of how melodic a
language sounded influenced
their ability to learn.
The researchers recruited 86
adult native German speakers (36
men and 50 women) with a range
of musical and linguistic abilities.
Some only spoke German
while others spoke up to three
foreign languages. None of the and repeats information during abilities were good predictors than low melodic participants
participants spoke any of the five learning. All participants took a of language performance. As to be professional musicians.
languages chosen for the study: short-term memory test, listening much as 59% of the differences Being a professional musician or
Chinese [sic], Japanese, Tagalog, to and recalling strings of digits. in language performance scores high melodic had large effects on
Thai and Russian. Participants were taught to could be predicted by the number language performance (f = 0.55
rate how melodic a language of languages spoken, short-term and f = 0.40), but these effects
sounded using samples of Slovak memory, musical ability and how were independent of each other.
It seems that the perception of
It seems that and Farsi. Then they listened to melodic the new language seemed melody in language really is in the
to the listener.
four samples of each of the five
To further investigate the
the perception unnamed test languages and rated influence of rating the new ear of the perceiver and does not
each on a scale of 0 (not melodic)
depend on musical talent.
of melody in to 10 (very melodic). language as melodic, the This is good news for both
The language performance task
language really consisted of listening to four sets participants were divided into two students and teachers, as there
groups: high melodic (those who
are several ways to boost the
is in the ear of of 11 syllables spoken by two male generally rated the languages as apparent tunefulness of language.
and two female native speakers of
Some of these tactics may mimic
more melodic) and low melodic.
the perceiver each of the five test languages. The You might expect that the high the first language of them all:
motherese, the way that parents
researchers took care to minimise
melodic group would also score
variation in speech rate and used higher on tests of musical ability, all over the world speak to their
only declarative statements rather but this was not the case: the infants – slowly, with more ‘sing
Musical aptitude (detecting than questions, which might have two groups did not differ in musical song’ intonation, variations in
changes in rhythm or tone) and apparent differences in intonation ability. The average score for the pitch and a lot of repetition.
singing ability were tested and and hence pitch. Participants were other major predictor of language
participants were also recorded asked to repeat the four phrases performance, short-term memory, REFERENCE
as being non-musicians (33), in each of the five languages. was also similar for both high n Christiner, M, Gross, C,
amateurs (21) or professional Performances were rated from 0 melodic and low melodic groups. Seither-Preisler, A and Schneider,
musicians (30). Presumably two to 10 by several native speakers Yet the high melodic group had P (2021): ‘The melody of
didn’t answer. with professional linguistic significantly higher performance speech: what the melodic
One ability well-known to backgrounds: agreement between scores in all five languages. perception of speech reveals
influence the acquisition of both raters was very high (Cronbach’s Professional musicians also about language performance
language and music is short- alpha 0.86-0.93). had better language performance and musical abilities’,
term memory – that part of the The collected scores were scores, but high melodic Languages 6:132; https//doi.org/
brain which temporarily stores analysed to identify which participants were no more likely 10.3390/languages6030132
8 November 2021