In a century where humans and machines—powered by artificial intelligence or not—increasingly work together, it is of interest to understand human processing of multi-sensory stimuli in relation to attention and working memory. This paper explores whether and when supporting visual information with rhythmic auditory stimuli can optimize multi-sensory information processing. In turn, this can make the interaction between humans or between machines and humans more engaging, rewarding and activating. For this purpose a novel working memory paradigm was developed where participants (...) are presented with a series of five target digits randomly interchanged with five distractor digits. Their goal is to remember the target digits and recall them orally. Depending on the condition support is provided by audio and/or rhythm. It is expected that the sound will lead to a better performance. It is also expected that this effect of sound is different in case of rhythmic and non-rhythmic sound. Last but not least, some variability is expected across participants. To make correct conclusions, the data of the experiment was statistically analyzed in a classic way, but also predictive models were developed in order to predict outcomes based on a range of input variables related to the experiment and the participant. The effect of auditory support could be confirmed, but no difference was observed between rhythmic and non-rhythmic sounds. Overall performance was indeed affected by individual differences, such as visual dominance or perceived task difficulty. Surprisingly a music education did not significantly affect the performance and even tended toward a negative effect. To better understand the underlying processes of attention, also brain activation data, e.g., by means of electroencephalography, should be recorded. This approach can be subject to a future work. (shrink)

Much has been written and said about music's time, much less— at least in recent epochs—about time's music. Today this most subtle, yet most powerful form of music finds fewer and fewer listeners. It has become, in fact, harder and harder to listen to. The “congruent melodies,” i.e. “the rhythms of times which were given to us to alleviate our labors” (as the 13th-century music theorist had put it) have long since been silenced and drowned by subsonic noises.* In its (...) organization of time, Western civilization has, to an appallingly large extent, replaced rhythmic aliveness with abstract measures, reducing it to a “functional mechanism” (Baudrillard 1974). The main tools by which these measures are set, the clock as we know it and the modern calendar, are obviously, taken as such, remarkable achievements, but in their impact on our lives they are not so much companions enabling us to be “in harmony with things at the right moment” (see the Chinese shih, Larre 1976) as they are hostile guardians “watching our steps.”. (shrink)

Evolutionary psychology often does not sufficiently document the innate constraint and domain specificity required for strong adaptationist argument. We develop these criteria within the domain of music. First, we advocate combining computational, developmental, cross-cultural, and neuroscience research to address the ways in which a domain is innately constrained. Candidate constraints in music include the importance of the octave and other simple pitch ratios, the categorization of the octave into tones, the importance of melodic contour, tonal hierarchies, and principles of grouping (...) and meter. Second, we advocate combining psychological, neuroscience, and genetic research across cognitive domains to address the domain specificity of such constraints. Currently available evidence suggests that the innate constraints in music are not specific to that domain, making it unclear which domain(s) provided the relevant selection pressures. (shrink)