Early Years: Creating Perceptual Space Where Music and Language Can Meet

ABSTRACT

Auditory perception and auditory cognition development in early years are foundational for social and emotional development and language acquisition. The ability to recognize sound patterns around us and the delicate balance between their acoustic features determines our understanding of the intrinsic nature of language, socio-emotional interactions, and music. Both acoustic feature recognition and an ability to effectively form a perceptual unit – an auditory object – are fundamental for developing an ability to make sense of sound. Since both music and language rely on the auditory system to perceive and produce sound, the potential of using music in interventions for children with language acquisition difficulties like Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) has been raised by numerous scientists. Based on personal experience, the current paper discusses opportunities for supporting auditory perception development in music-based interactions using instrumental sound patterns. It details how manipulation of acoustic features like pitch, rhythm, timbre, duration, and intensity can help develop auditory skills like auditory pattern recognition, categorization of sounds by timbre, pitch, auditory object formation, and symbolization – the prerequisites for recognizing vocal identity, understanding spoken language, and articulating spoken messages.

KEYWORDS:

• Auditory perception
• infant development
• music
• autism
• prosody
• music therapy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Diana Thielst

Diana Thielst, M.D., is a scientist with research interests in autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders; professionally trained musician experienced in performing to live audiences at concerts and events internationally, including Switzerland, France, Germany, Denmark, and Sweden; and creator of music-based apps for children without functional language.