关键词: 绝对音高, 音乐加工, 音乐训练, 神经机制

Abstract: The evolutionary origins of music has become a controversial topic, given that music has no survival value. Unlike nonadaptationist theories, adaptationist theories argue that the human ability of music was the target of natural selection (e.g., sexual selection). An important evidence for this hypothesis is that absolute pitch (AP), an ability to name pitch letter of an isolated musical notes in the absence of a reference note, is associated with a specific genetic basis. In the domain of music education, AP has long been viewed as an important indicator of human musical talent. This view is based on the fact that several world-class composers and performers are known to possess AP. This is circular. Indeed, little is known about whether AP facilitates music processing. The aims of the current study was to review the existing literature on AP and investigate music perception and its neural mechanisms in AP. It has been shown that AP possessors have superior perception of music: AP possessors exhibited better scores in identifying melodic intervals, detecting differences in melodies, as compared with non-AP possessors. Moreover, they also demonstrated higher performance than non-AP possessors on the tasks of musical syntax perception and music memory. However, a few studies suggest that AP possessors perform worse than non-AP possessors in identifying pitch interval between two tones in non-C major contexts (e. g., mistune Eb and F# majors), when informed of tonic, or tonic with a tonal cadence. They also showed poorer recognition for transposed melodies from standard melodies (played in C major) than non-AP possessors, or poorer performance when making a same /different discrimination of pitch interval between auditorily presented melody and a visual notated melodies. The inconsistent results between above-mentioned studies may be due to the fact that the latter studies use mistune tones, and tasks require the strategy of relative pitch, which relies on a reference note in judgment of pitch interval. AP is associated with structural and functional brain changes. Compared with non-AP possessors, AP possessors exhibited earlier ERP latency and smaller P300 response in music perception, reflecting higher sensitivity and easier processing for music. Furthermore, the brain particularity for the AP possessors reflected in larger size and increased use of brain regions, such as left planum temporale, bilateral superior temporal sulcus, left inferior frontal gyrus and right marginal gyrus, which have been proved to be closely related to different aspects of music processing. Moreover, The neuronal connections among these regions were also found stronger in AP possessors. Taken together, AP possessors showed the enhanced music perception and memory. Given that the influences of gene and linguistic environment found in previous studies could also be explained by the factor of musical training, it seems that the acquisition of AP and its advantage in music processing should be due to music training and its interactions with other factors. However, some studies have not controlled for the factor of music training. The current study suggests that the enhanced music performance may be attributed to longer music training for AP possessors than for non-AP possessors. Future studies need to investigate the impact of music training on music processing and further examine whether there is the advantage of music processing in AP when years of music training is completely controlled.

Key words: absolute pitch, musical processing, musical training, neural mechanisms