THE ROLE OF TEMPORAL ADAPTATION AND ANTICIPATION MECHANISMS IN REDUCING IMPACT OF ERRORS IN MUSICAL JOINT ACTION
Marta Radice, Rokas Maksevicius, Peter Erik Keller, Francesca Ciardo · 2023
During complex social interactions like musical ensemble performances, people “stay in the loop” thanks to intentional and planned interpersonal coordination. This is particularly relevant when during a shared task, our partner commits an error. The present study aimed to evaluate how a leader-follower pair of individuals adapt their performance to reduce the negative impact of errors on coordination during a musical task. To this end, we asked pairs of participants to perform a musical sequence production task in three different conditions, across which we manipulated the frequency of error occurrence (0 vs. 60% vs. 30%). Each member of the pair was assigned to either the role of leader or follower. The leader had access to a visual metronome indicating the correct tempo and sequence of keys, including ‘errors’, to be played during the tasks. The follower was instructed to play the correct sequence of keys at the tempo of the leader. Results showed that for sequences including errors, participants’performance was characterized by lower variability in asynchrony and higher interpersonal coupling compared to correct sequences. Results are interpretable in terms of top-down control over sensorimotor mechanisms of coordination.