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This article argues that the capacity of music to reliably cue both autobiographical memories and fictional imaginings can be leveraged to better understand the relationship and interdependence between memory and imagination more generally. The multiple levels involved in musical engagement provide a rich forum for investigating how emotional, semantic, and contextual associations with musical cues influence both memories and imaginings. Moreover, musical excerpts are extended in time and can influence the trajectory of a memory or imagining dynamically as it develops, allowing for a more precise manipulation of the implied semantic space. Because music’s uses and contextual associations are culturally constrained, and culture can be shared, autobiographical memories and fictional imaginings cued by music can show surprising similarities among individuals from the same culture. This article surveys the research on music-evoked autobiographical memories and music-evoked fictional imaginings, proposing a framework for bringing these separate strands of work together to shed light on larger questions about shared underlying mechanisms.
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Creativity and tradition: Music and bifocal stance theory
Abstract We argue that music can serve as a time-sensitive lens into the interplay between instrumental and ritual stances in cultural evolution. Over various timescales, music can switch between pursuing an end goal or not, and between presenting a causal opacity that is resolvable, or not. With these fluctuations come changes in the motivational structures that drive innovation versus copying.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1945436
- PAR ID:
- 10408581
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Behavioral and Brain Sciences
- Volume:
- 45
- ISSN:
- 0140-525X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1017/s0140525x22001212
