Understanding Relationships between Reading Behavior and Difficulty Level of Musical Score based on Cognitive-behavioral Science: Competency Level Evaluation via Musical Score Reading Processes

摘要

This paper proposes a method to understand relationships between reading behavior and the level of difficulty of musical score. The model of reading behavior is constructed by following the cognitive-behavioral science approach, which has three components: external objects, and internal perceptual-cognitive-motor processes and memory. It suggests that the most critical for smooth score reading is that he or she is able to acquire the right number of objects, k, in a single eye-fixation and to retrieve their relevant information from long-term memory within the time allowed. The model predicts that differences in smoothness should appear in the mean, t_(Mean), and/or median, t_(Med), duration times of the field of view, which are strongly related with the degree of matching of the musical score with the level of competency of the student. It was estimated in the space of the following five parameters by collecting eye-movement data: the number of notes, rests, accidentals, meter and velocity, and the other musical symbols. This paper concludes that the estimation procedure should be effective to evaluate the level of difficulty of musical scores perceived by an individual person.