David Huron
School of Music
Ohio State University, April 29, 2002
A comprehensive theory of musical expectation will be presented. The psychological mechanisms underlying expectation will be introduced and the associated subjective experiences described. Experimental evidence concerning the role of learning and enculturation will be highlighted. The presentation will address such questions as why a deceptive cadence continues to sound deceptive even when you know it is coming, why ending on the tonic pitch sounds "nice", why boredom makes you sleepy, and why poetry is good for you. The presentation is drawn from a full-length manuscript available on the web at http://dactyl.som.ohio-state.edu/Music829D/Notes/Expectation.html