Examining Absolute and Relative Pitch as Automatic Processes via Auditory-Visual Stroop Test

Relative pitch is the ability to identify intervals between pitches, whereas absolute pitch is the less common ability to identify and reproduce musical pitches without reference to other pitches. This study utilized an auditory-visual Stroop test to investigate the automaticity of absolute and relative pitch. Absolute and relative pitch possessors simultaneously heard a piano tone and viewed a music note in treble clef on a computer screen. The piano tone and viewed note were either congruent or incongruent with one another, and participants were asked to vocally identify either the visual or auditory stimuli. I hypothesized that absolute pitch possessors would exhibit slower reaction times than relative pitch possessors when identifying notes during incongruent as opposed to congruent pitch and note trials, which would suggest that absolute pitch possessors are unable to suppress pitch labeling and therefore experience cognitive interference. Contrary to my predictions, however, I found only a main effect of congruency, such that both absolute and relative pitch possessors were equally slowed down by incongruent pitch and note trials. These results suggest that relative pitch possessors may be able to acquire a sense of absolute pitch when exposed to multiple instances of congruent visual and auditory stimuli. In addition, these findings demonstrate that cognitive interference can occur cross-modally between two different sensory pathways such as audition and vision, and that this interference is not limited to individuals who have internalized and absolute (i.e., one to one) relationships between sounds and images.