# name
The Influence of Individuals’ Musical Training and Pragmatic Skills on the Perception of f0 Manipulation in a Foreign Language

# metadata.dc.description[].value
Treballs Finals del Màster en Ciència Cognitiva i Llenguatge, Facultat de Filosofia, Universitat de Barcelona, Curs: 2023-2024, Tutor: Wendy Elvira-García

# metadata.dc.description.abstract[].value
In speech perception studies, particularly of intonation, several factors have
previously been noticed to influence one’s perceptive skills and, accordingly, their
ability to perceive smaller changes in intonation. While sociodemographic factors like
gender and age have often been studied in this context, other factors like musical
training and individual differences, particularly individual pragmatic skills, are gradually
becoming more interesting for those studying speech perception. Playing an
instrument is argued to involve many highly complex cognitive functions and affect
neuroplasticity and importantly, it has been studied in connection with auditory
processing. Furthermore, the study of the influence of individual skills on auditory
processing shows a positive relation between higher pragmatic skills and perception.
While both of these factors are proven significant, the research tends to focus on one
of them, rarely comparing the two skills or examining which one has a higher influence
on the perception of intonation. The present study addresses this gap by examining
Croatian native speakers’ perception of f0 stimulation in Catalan, a language they are
unfamiliar with. 91 participants took a discrimination test in which they listened to 20
pairs of stimuli and had to answer whether the stimuli in each pair were the same. The
analysis was done in two steps, first, through a confusion matrix and analysis of
answers for each pair of stimuli, and second, by building three linear regression models
in order to compare the relationship between musical training and pragmatic skills and
the correct answers.
The results demonstrate a good overall precision, but lower recall score and establish
the fourth pair of stimuli as a threshold in which the majority of participants observe
the difference between the stimuli. The second model, which included musical
training, but no pragmatic skills as a variable, has proven to be the best-performing
one, showing that in this study musical training played a more significant role than
pragmatic skills in individuals’ ability to perceive changes of f0 in an unfamiliar
language.

# metadata.dc.description.sponsorship[].value
In speech perception studies, particularly of intonation, several factors have
previously been noticed to influence one’s perceptive skills and, accordingly, their
ability to perceive smaller changes in intonation. While sociodemographic factors like
gender and age have often been studied in this context, other factors like musical
training and individual differences, particularly individual pragmatic skills, are gradually
becoming more interesting for those studying speech perception. Playing an
instrument is argued to involve many highly complex cognitive functions and affect
neuroplasticity and importantly, it has been studied in connection with auditory
processing. Furthermore, the study of the influence of individual skills on auditory
processing shows a positive relation between higher pragmatic skills and perception.
While both of these factors are proven significant, the research tends to focus on one
of them, rarely comparing the two skills or examining which one has a higher influence
on the perception of intonation. The present study addresses this gap by examining
Croatian native speakers’ perception of f0 stimulation in Catalan, a language they are
unfamiliar with. 91 participants took a discrimination test in which they listened to 20
pairs of stimuli and had to answer whether the stimuli in each pair were the same. The
analysis was done in two steps, first, through a confusion matrix and analysis of
answers for each pair of stimuli, and second, by building three linear regression models
in order to compare the relationship between musical training and pragmatic skills and
the correct answers.
The results demonstrate a good overall precision, but lower recall score and establish
the fourth pair of stimuli as a threshold in which the majority of participants observe
the difference between the stimuli. The second model, which included musical
training, but no pragmatic skills as a variable, has proven to be the best-performing
one, showing that in this study musical training played a more significant role than
pragmatic skills in individuals’ ability to perceive changes of f0 in an unfamiliar
language.

# metadata.dc.source[].value
Màster Oficial - Ciència Cognitiva i Llenguatge (CCiL)

# metadata.dc.title[].value
The Influence of Individuals’ Musical Training and Pragmatic Skills on the Perception of f0 Manipulation in a Foreign Language