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JRMXXX10.1177/0022429415595621Journal of Research in Music EducationMadsen and Geringer

Article
Journal of Research in Music Education
2015, Vol. 63(3) 336­–348
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20th-Century Art Music: A DOI: 10.1177/0022429415595621
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Replication and Extension

Clifford K. Madsen1 and John M. Geringer1

Abstract
This investigation replicates previous research into K–12 students’ responses to mid-
20th-century art music. The study extends that research to include undergraduates
and graduates as well as an additional group of graduate students who had taken
a 20th-century music class. Children’s responses showed remarkable consistency
and indicated that younger children gave higher mean liking ratings than did older
students. Kindergarten and third-grade youngsters preferred all but two of the
excerpts compared to their older counterparts. There appeared to be a large
difference between younger students’ responses compared to 6th- and 9th-grade
students, who were more similar to undergraduate and graduate music students,
while 12th graders generally gave the lowest responses. Preferences for the group
of graduate students who studied 20th-century music were not significantly higher
than those of graduate students who had not had an additional course. These results
corroborate previous research that illustrates differences in preference between
different ages of listeners.

Keywords
music listening, music preference, 20th-century music, children, adults

The extent to which people prefer different musical genres and physical properties of
music has been the subject of a number of studies in music education. LeBlanc (1980)
proposed a model of music preferences that included three broad categories of

1Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA

Corresponding Author:
John M. Geringer, Center for Music Research, College of Music, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
32306-1180, USA.
Email: jgeringer@fsu.edu
Madsen and Geringer 337

variables that influence the phenomenon: characteristics of the music, characteristics

of the environment, and characteristics of the listener. All of these are mediated by
physiological enabling conditions, basic attention, and current affective state. Various
categories and different levels within these factors contribute to this original model.
Droe (2006), in reviewing the literature on music preference and music education,
summarized theoretical models of preference. Droe listed a number of factors that
influence music choices, including race and gender, that were explored by Killian
(1990) and McCrary (1993). He further noted that analysis of social factors in music
learning has shown a dependence on the sociocultural context in which a person devel-
ops outside of school, such as at home, within the person’s peer group (also see
LeBlanc, 1982), and within the general community. Although age was not specifically
identified as an influence on preference in LeBlanc’s model, maturation was.
Additionally, LeBlanc (1982) listed stimulus complexity as a variable, a charac-
teristic he described as being perceived as either too much or too little. If too much,
the listener may become frustrated; if too little, bored. Although it is unclear how
20th-century music “fits” within this category, references to much of 20th-century
music are difficult without considering the “optimum” level of complexity described
by LeBlanc (1980). North and Hargreaves (1997) made a case for the appropriate-
ness of music for a particular situation. For example, if children often use music
mainly to accompany everyday activities, change their emotional states, and
develop their personal and social identity, they most likely will select familiar and
low-complexity music that does not demand a high attention level and with which
they identify.
Our review of research revealed several studies that made use of 20th-century
Western art music compositions, particularly those composed after World War II.
Boal-Palheiros (1998), who studied children’s music and listening styles at home ver-
sus at school, suggested that a teacher’s initial training in music schools or conserva-
tories has a strong influence on what he or she teaches. It was noted that many tertiary
music institutions have emphasized primarily 18th- and 19th-century music repertoire,
neglecting other periods of Western music as well as music of different styles and
cultures. School music books, which also have a strong influence on teachers, tradi-
tionally have dedicated only short references to 20th-century art music, especially to
that composed in the second half of the century (Boal-Palheiros, 1998). It has been
emphasized repeatedly that although many teachers advocate the use of a wide variety
of musical styles at different school levels, most music educators rarely include 20th-
century art music (Boal-Palheiros, Ilari, & Monteiro, 2006). Additionally, the influ-
ence of context in children’s responses to music has been investigated (Boal-Palheiros
& Hargreaves, 2001), whereby the listening responses of children at home versus at
school produced different results and imply that there are different modes of listening
affected by environment. Sloboda and Juslin (2001) also suggested that extrinsic emo-
tion is determined strongly by contextual factors, such as physical, social, and cultural
environments.
Familiarity with a musical style or repertoire has been shown to be an important
determinant for music preferences (Berlyne, 1974; Hargreaves & North, 1999;
338 Journal of Research in Music Education 63(3)

LeBlanc, 1982). Sloboda and Juslin (2001) suggested that structural characteristics of
the music influence intrinsic emotion (cognitive and physiological systems including
attentiveness). Ginocchio (2008) and LeBlanc (1987) showed that preferences are
influenced by characteristics of the music. This research indicated younger students
prefer fast tempos, distinctive rhythms, well-defined meters, conjunct melodies, and
moderate degrees of complexity. Finnas (1989) highlighted that young students also
prefer consonance to dissonance and vocal music to instrumental.
Berlyne’s (1974) new experimental aesthetics proposed that the degree of complex-
ity and familiarity of artistic stimuli produce pleasure by manipulating the level of
arousal of the observer. Hargreaves (1986) extended this notion: People preferred
stimuli that produce in them an intermediate level of arousal, such as music that is
moderately familiar and perceived as being of intermediate complexity. Thus, it can be
speculated that students may respond negatively to the “new” and “complex” charac-
teristics of post-tonal music, in a way similar to not liking complex music from other
periods and styles. Other research has demonstrated age and developmental differ-
ences in children’s response to, and preference for, various musical styles, including
20th-century art music (Gardner, 1973; Hargreaves, Comber, & Colley, 1995;
Hargreaves & North, 1999; LeBlanc, Sims, Siivola, & Obert, 1996; Madsen &
Geringer, 2010; Zillmann & Gan, 1997).
LeBlanc et al. (1996) also advanced the hypothesis that “open-earedness,” a term
coined by Hargreaves (1982), or tolerance for a wide range of different styles, increases
in childhood, declines in early adolescence, partially rebounds in later adolescence,
and then declines once again in adulthood (Ginocchio, 2008). Younger children may
be more “open-eared” than older children to different forms of music, and older chil-
dren may be less tolerant to styles that are outside their favorite or peer-approved
music. Russell (1997) suggested two explanations for the different preferences of
younger and older people: (a) Music preferences formed in youth tend to persist across
the adult years, and (b) preferences change as people grow older, as new preferences
develop, and as more exposure to music occurs.
On the basis of the preceding research, we investigated K–12 students’ preferences
for mid-20th-century art music using repertoire examined by Temko (1971). In his
study, the composition and theory faculty of a large university previously had chosen
selections using the criterion that excerpts be representative of music composed in the
mid-20th century, which included total serialized (post-Webern serialism), aleatoric,
post-tonal, and electronic music. Temko asked musically trained participants to listen
to and sing immediately after each selection whatever pitch came to mind. Interestingly,
Temko found that even with these selections, his participants almost always sang
pitches clustering around some imposed “tonality.” We selected excerpts used in our
research from the Temko list. This music generally comprises the period starting after
World War II and lasting until the early1960s.
We conducted an initial study (Madsen & Geringer, 2010) that explored prefer-
ences for these excerpts of K–12 students. Data from our first study (N = 160; 32 in
five age categories) indicated kindergarten and third graders rated almost everything
highly; sixth-grade children also rated most examples highly, while students in the 9th
Madsen and Geringer 339

and 12th grades rated all excerpts significantly lower in preference. Younger children
responded more positively to unfamiliar music than did older students.
The purpose of the current study was (1) to determine if a complete replication
consisting of another similar K–12 cohort would yield similar results, (2) to investi-
gate older (undergraduate and graduate) students’ ratings of these same selections, and
(3) to determine if advanced graduate music students who previously had taken a class
in 20th-century music would yield results different from those who had not undertaken
such instruction.

Method
Participants
In the present study, we both replicated and extended the previous study (Madsen &
Geringer, 2010) by investigating preferences of children through adult listeners for the
same mid-20th-century art music. We first replicated with another cohort (students
K–12) from the same school as previously used but 3 years later. Although it is con-
ceivable that some students were sampled again in the second cohort, we considered
that possibility to be nonconsequential; it is unlikely that such students recalled 30-s
excerpts heard 3 years prior with sufficient detail to bias current responses. Direct
comparisons (using independent t tests) between the two studies indicated only very
small and nonsignificant differences between the two samples across all of the K–12
categories. We then extended the earlier study by adding two groups representative of
undergraduate and graduate music majors. Furthermore, we added a second group of
graduate students who had taken a 20th-century music literature class at the graduate
level, making a total of 256 participants, 32 persons in each of the eight settings.
Participants included kindergarten and 3rd-, 6th-, 9th-, and 12th grade levels as well as
university undergraduate and graduate students. Thus, the original study was repli-
cated with the addition of three groups of adult listeners. All K–12 participants were
volunteers chosen from the same university research-and-development school that
enrolls students with the purpose of representing the larger population of the region
and state. All students in the study participated in their music class. Undergraduate and
graduate students were volunteers from a large school of music in the southeastern
United States. All students were tested in groups—younger children within their regu-
lar class, and middle school and high school students within their regular band, orches-
tra, choir, or general group. All procedures were approved by both school district and
university-level institutional review boards.
The research-and-development school is a K–12 school with daily music instruc-
tion for all children in Grades K through 8. The school has approximately 1,700 stu-
dents who represent a population typical of other school sites in the state on the basis
of its selection criteria. Students are not selected on the basis of academic achievement
but are selected to represent demographic considerations. Thereby across grade levels,
every classroom contains approximately the same number of boys and girls. The
school is ethnically representative of the surrounding area and includes students with
340 Journal of Research in Music Education 63(3)

various academic and physical challenges. Additionally, the school purports to have
strong programs in academics as well as award-winning arts and athletic programs.
Beginning in ninth grade, students may elect choral, band, or orchestral studies that
meet every day. Because of student selection, these groups do not have gender bal-
ance; yet when we sampled across the entire band, choral, general, and orchestra
classes, this balance was more equitable. The socioeconomic and family backgrounds
were partially controlled by the entrance selection process prescribed by the school,
which selects students from six surrounding counties to approximate demographics of
the entire state.
The examples used in the study were administered by the regular classroom teach-
ers and therefore “nested” within the ongoing study of music. In every case, immedi-
ately after having students complete the listening, each teacher used the experience to
relate this experience to other music activities that had previously been completed.
This was accomplished in the K–8 classes by the regular general music teacher and by
the orchestra, band, and choral teachers within their venues. All of the music teachers
stated that they regularly had students listen to and perform a diverse selection of
music, including world music and some 20th-century selections.

Procedure
All listeners first heard a short excerpt of Subotnik’s Wild Bull as a practice example,
to familiarize participants with the procedure and to help clarify any questions that
listeners may have had. This was followed by six short excerpts (which ranged in dura-
tion from 26 to 32 s) selected from Berio’s Circles (1960), Boulez’s Structures-II,
Chapitre I (1961), Stockhausen’s Nr. 5 Zeitmasse for Five Woodwinds (1956), Varése’s
Poéme Électronique (1958), Cage’s Aria with Fontana Mix (1958), and Xenakis’s
Orient-Occident (1960). Each excerpt was presented twice: first in an order selected
randomly; the second presentation was counterbalanced in the reverse order. We
selected all six excerpts from those used by Temko (1971), who investigated adult
music majors’ pitch responses to 20 excerpts of post-tonal music.
Students in kindergarten and third grade were given scripted instructions by their
regular classroom music teacher. Children then listened to the examples and marked
their papers by circling one of a series of drawings of faces: a seven-point scaling of
sad through happy faces, which were later transcribed into numbers. Listeners in the
sixth-grade through graduate student groups rated their responses on a seven-point
scale: The words Dislike and Like served as anchors on the lower and upper ends of the
scale. Groups listened to the excerpts presented on CD played on a high-quality por-
table stereo system. The same system was used for all participants; volume levels were
set at a moderate level and remained constant throughout all testing.
We calculated a Pearson correlation coefficient between the two orders of presenta-
tion on the participants’ ratings for the six pairs of excerpts to test for conceivable
effects of order. The coefficient was positive and significant (r = .86, p < .001).
Therefore, we eliminated the factor of presentation order and used the mean of the two
orders as raw data in all subsequent analyses. We tested the consistency of responses
Madsen and Geringer 341

Table 1.  Means and Standard Deviations of Ratings for Age Levels.

Age Group M SD
Kindergarten 4.60 0.87
3rd grade 4.22 0.65
6th grade 3.50 0.90
9th grade 3.50 0.89
12th grade 2.65 0.98
Undergraduate 2.89 1.31
Graduate 3.01 0.99
Graduate with course 3.47 0.92

to the excerpts and obtained a Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of .83, suggesting that the
items had acceptable internal consistency.

Results
Table 1 presents means and standard deviations across the six excerpts for each age
group. Children in kindergarten and third grade gave higher liking ratings than did the
other age groups. Ratings of sixth graders, ninth graders, and the graduate students
who took a 20th-century music literature course were similar (means were approxi-
mately 3.5). Twelfth graders gave the lowest ratings overall (M = 2.7), followed by
undergraduates (who also had the highest standard deviation) and the graduate student
group who did not take the 20th-century literature course. Figure 1 presents a box plot
showing the age group distributions across the excerpts. This display also demon-
strates highest ratings for kindergarten and 3rd-grade listeners, lowest overall ratings
for 12th graders, and the largest range in responses for undergraduates. We also viewed
ratings for the individual excerpts across all age groups and found that means ranged
from 3.1 (Boulez and Cage) to 4.2 (Xenakis), with standard deviations all very similar
for each of the examples (approximately 1.7).
We used a significance level (α) of .05 for all statistical tests. We tested the assump-
tions of a two-way analysis of variance with one between-subjects factor (age groups)
and one within-subjects factor (six excerpts) and found a violation of the assumption
of sphericity. The six excerpts were found to be nonorthogonal, Mauchly’s W(14) =
.729, p < .001; there were significant linear relationships between the excerpts (Pearson
coefficients ranged from .22 to .48). Therefore, we used multivariate criteria to ana-
lyze participants’ ratings to bypass the assumption of sphericity in within-subject anal-
yses having more than two levels. Using ratings for the six excerpts as variates, the
MANOVA had one between-subjects factor (age groups). The age groups showed a
significant multivariate main effect, Wilks’ Λ = .46, F(42, 1143) = 4.91, p < .001, mul-
tivariate η2p = .122. Prior to examining the univariate effects, we used the Bonferroni
correction to adjust the alpha level to α = .008 (.05/6), because six dependent variables
were analyzed. Univariate ANOVA results indicated that five of the six excerpts were
342 Journal of Research in Music Education 63(3)

Figure 1.  Box plots indicate grade level distributions of mean ratings across the six
excerpts.

rated significantly different by the age groups: F ratios (7, 248) ranged from 3.40 to
13.97, p < .002, with η2p values ranging from .088 to .283. Only the Xenakis excerpt
did not show any significant univariate differences between the age groups, F(7,
248) = 1.89, p = .07. Listener responses to the individual excerpts are displayed in
Figure 2. Response patterns were very similar for four of the excerpts (Boulez, Cage,
Stockhausen, and Berio). The kindergarten students, followed by third graders, gave
the highest ratings. Mean ratings then decreased to the lowest level for 12th graders
and then increased again for the university students. Means for the Varése excerpt
were generally higher among K–12 students, and lowest ratings were given by under-
graduates rather than 12th graders. Ratings for the Xenakis excerpt was the most dif-
ferent from the others and did not display the general U shape that we found for the
other excerpts. Compared to the other five, this example generally was liked by all
ages of listeners, with higher means for all age groups except for the two youngest
listener groups.
We also examined responses of the graduate students who had taken a course in
20th-century music literature. Although mean ratings for these students were typically
higher than means of the graduate students who had not taken such a course, post hoc
Scheffé test differences (adjusted for multiple testing) were not significant between
these two groups for any of the excerpts. Those graduate students who had taken the
course did not differ significantly from any of the other age groups for the Boulez,
Stockhausen, Varése, and Xenakis examples; however, differences were found between
Madsen and Geringer 343

Figure 2.  Mean ratings of each excerpt for the eight age groups.

these graduate students and kindergarteners for the Berio and Cage excerpts and with
third graders for the Cage example.

Discussion
This research replicated previous research that investigated K–12 responses to
mid-20th-century art music and extended that research to include undergraduates and
graduates as well as an additional group of graduate students who had taken a 20th-
century music class. Children’s responses showed remarkable consistency and indi-
cated that younger children gave higher mean liking ratings than older students.
Differences in preference responses among schoolchildren of various ages have strong
implications for music education. The present investigation is similar to previous
research on trends in music preferences among different-age children. Children’s pref-
erence for different musical styles seems to decline in early adolescence when prefer-
ences change (Gembris, 2002; Hargreaves et al., 1995; Hargreaves & North, 1999;
Kopiez & Lehmann 2008; LeBlanc et al., 1996). We speculated that the younger chil-
dren in this study were therefore more likely to respond positively to an unfamiliar
musical style than were the older children and young adults.
Developmental research suggests a general decrease in the motivation of adoles-
cents for trying certain school experiences (Hargreaves, 1986). It seems that younger
children have a more positive and open attitude toward a wide range of styles in many
aspects of art and design, which would include mid-20th-century art music (Hargreaves,
1982, 1986). Such appears to be the case in this study. In contrast, the older adolescent
participants consistently expressed a lower preference for selected excerpts, which may
result from their attitude toward art music in general or “school music” as a whole.
344 Journal of Research in Music Education 63(3)

Responses of listeners were, for four of the pieces, very similar to data reported by
LeBlanc et al. (1996) and Hargreaves et al. (1995). This provides further support for
the “U-shape” hypothesis concerning music preference according to which young
children up to 8 years or so express liking for virtually every music style; there is then
a decline in “open-earedness” for different music styles accompanied by strong prefer-
ence for popular styles through adolescence, followed by an increase in tolerance for
different types and styles of music among young adults. The degree to which liking for
various styles increases after adolescence seems to be influenced not only by age but
by gender and music training as well (Hargreaves et al., 1995). This U-shape pattern
was apparent for the Boulez, Cage, Stockhausen, and Berio examples in this study.
Responses to the Varése and Xenakis excerpts showed a somewhat different pattern
between the age groups, particularly to the Xenakis. Responses to this latter example
were the most flat across the different ages (see Figure 2) and was the only one of the
six that showed no significant univariate effect of age on liking. In fact, sixth and ninth
graders gave mean ratings comparable to the other groups. The Xenakis example was
one of two excerpts (the Varése was the other) that used primarily electronic sound
sources; it also contained a strong sense of pulse and included an interesting “gong”-
like sound. Perhaps to a number of listeners, it seemed similar to some current popular
music that might be classified within the genre of “electronica.” The Varése excerpt
was rated differently by the various age groups, also reaching relatively high ratings
among 6th and 9th graders; however, the lowest ratings were given by undergraduate
listeners rather than 12th graders. This excerpt, also composed for electronic sounds,
can be described as similar to sound effects that one might associate with a horror
movie, which might appeal to adolescent listeners.
Research completed over 30 years ago indicated that very young children can dif-
ferentiate easily between various changes within musical selections even if they do not
know any music terminology (Montgomery, 1978). In Montgomery’s study, very
young children pressed a bar to show they “heard when the music changed.” In fact,
they heard almost every change possible: rhythm changes, tempo changes, instrumen-
tal changes, and so on. These young children heard as many changes in the music as
did older subjects, yet they were not able to describe verbally what it was that they
heard. If children can differentiate various sounds at such young ages, it is interesting
to speculate regarding reasons for the somewhat decreased liking shown by listeners
as they are taught more repertoire, formal music vocabulary, and other aspects of
music literacy within the school setting. Perhaps research could be designed to address
aspects of these issues as well, such as exploring the specific nature of the relationship
between music knowledge acquisition and music preference with possible implica-
tions for lifelong learning.
One model has been proposed that suggests when a task requires an individual to
attend to music listening, this attention requires a high degree of participant involve-
ment (Madsen & Geringer, 2000/2001). If students are given “something specific to
listen for” and/or also must write a response and/or engage in any ongoing task, then
attentiveness and appreciation are increased. Alternately, in a situation where music
becomes a competing factor in relation to another task, such as reading or studying, the
Madsen and Geringer 345

music actually may be phased out of awareness so that the person may attend to the
task he or she considers more important (Madsen, 1987; Madsen, Diaz & Geringer,
2009; Madsen & Wolfe, 1979). Although many studies have indicated that people who
study music develop the ability to discriminate greater differences and more subtle
nuances within music, research also has indicated that when participants are listening
with great discernment, they often perceive musical differences that do not exist (e.g.,
Madsen, Geringer, & Madsen, 2009). Some forms of heightened discrimination actu-
ally might get in the way of meaningful listening when errors in performances and/or
differences in interpretations cause a person not to prefer or to attend to certain musi-
cal events. The one constant factor seems to be focus of attention. Without a compel-
ling focus of attention, we suggest that meaningful listening can be diluted much the
same as in other situations where a person is “bathed in sound” but cannot sustain the
necessary attentiveness to be truly committed to a listening experience.
The present large comparison study indicates differential levels of preferences
between different levels of age and musical training. Yet if even very young children
can “hear” subtle nuances even if not being able to verbalize them, and if young chil-
dren actually like almost all music (whether tonal or atonal, traditional or nontradi-
tional), then it seems every attempt ought to be made by music educators to emphasize
these positive attributes throughout life. As Droe (2006) noted, “the greatest payoff of
all should be the enjoyment a student gets when creating or listening to music” (p. 30).
Therefore, to address the first research question, whether a complete replication
consisting of another similar K–12 cohort would yield similar results, the answer is
yes. The second research question concerned investigating older (undergraduate and
graduate) students’ ratings of these same selections; results demonstrated that they did
not rate these selections similar to younger students. The third research question was
to determine if advanced graduate music students who had previously taken a class in
20th-century literature would yield responses different from those who had not taken
such instruction. Our data indicated they did not. Apparently the formal study of this
style period does not necessarily increase preference ratings when compared to similar
advanced students who have not had such a class. We suggest that music teachers not
only continue to provide a wide palette of music listening activities to students of all
ages but also devote substantially more time to find ways to increase and maintain a
high focus of attention throughout any complex music listening experience.
In addition, more research should be carried out using different music selections as
well as with different populations. Although the music excerpts used in this study were
chosen with care from previous research, the vast compositional differences within this
period and even within the output of each composer warrant additional investigation.
Studies using different groups of children and adults to ascertain both extant prefer-
ences as well as more effective methods of presentation and instruction also should be
investigated. For example, the unique structure of the K–12 school that served as the
site for the present study and the nature of that school’s particular music program were
not representative in that children in most school settings do not have music instruction
every day. Additionally, since the 9th- to 12th-grade participants also were involved in
some type of music instruction, other students who do not receive such instruction also
346 Journal of Research in Music Education 63(3)

should be studied. Furthermore, because all university-level students were music

majors, other groups should be studied that represent a cross-section of undergraduates
and graduates. Obviously, more research is warranted.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.

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Author Biographies
Clifford K. Madsen is Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor in the College of Music at
Florida State University, where he serves as coordinator of music education/music therapy/
contemporary media. His research interests are in perception, cognition, and music teacher
education.
John M. Geringer is Lewis V. Pankaskie Professor of Music and the director of the Center for
Music Research at Florida State University. His research interests are in perception and cogni-
tion, particularly in relation to acoustical changes within a variety of musical contexts.
Submitted October 4, 2013; accepted December 16, 2014.