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Super-expressive voices: Music to my ears?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2008

Elizabeth A. Simpson
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602. simpsone@uga.eduhttp://simpsone.myweb.uga.eduwoliver@uga.edudoree@uga.eduhttp://www.uga.edu/psychology/primate
William T. Oliver
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602. simpsone@uga.eduhttp://simpsone.myweb.uga.eduwoliver@uga.edudoree@uga.eduhttp://www.uga.edu/psychology/primate
Dorothy Fragaszy
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602. simpsone@uga.eduhttp://simpsone.myweb.uga.eduwoliver@uga.edudoree@uga.eduhttp://www.uga.edu/psychology/primate

Abstract

We present evidence from neuroimaging and brain lesion studies that emotional contagion may not be a mechanism underlying musical emotions. Our brains distinguish voice from non-voice sounds early in processing, and dedicate more resources to such processing. We argue that super-expressive voice theory currently cannot account for evidence of the dissociation in processing musical emotion and voice prosody.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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