Early childhood music education and predisposition to absolute pitch: teasing apart genes and environment.

Twelve years ago in this journal, Pro®ta and Bidder [1988] reported the ®rst evidence for familial aggregation of a rare cognitive phenotype known commonly as ``perfect pitch'', also designated ``absolute pitch. '' Since that report, several studies [Baharloo et al., 1998; Gregersen et al., 1999] provided evidence for genetic and environmental effects in predisposing to the development of absolute pitch (AP). Absolute pitch is a relatively uncommon cognitive ability possessed by a minority of professional and amateur musicians, characterized by their ability to identify pitch names, or to recall speci®c pitches, without bene®t of a reference pitch; this is usually accomplished in a relatively effortless and instantaneous fashion [Ward and Burns, 1982; Gregersen, 1998]. The prevalence of AP in the general population is unknown because it cannot be ascertained in subjects unless they possess at least a minimum amount of musical education. The prevalence of AP in populations of students in professional level music schools or in the personnel of major orchestras is in the range of 10±15% [Baharloo et al., 1998; Gregersen et al., 1999]. This is in contrast to the prevalence estimate of 1/1,500 in amateur music students reported previously [Pro®ta and Bidder, 1988]. A history of formal musical training before age 7 is widely acknowledged to predispose to AP; however, such training is neither necessary nor suf®cient in most persons. As noted above, substantial familial aggregation of AP occurs, although it is unclear to what degree this re ̄ects genetic factors [Baharloo et al., 1998; Gregersen et al., 1999]. We report the results of a survey of 1067 music students who were enrolled in music theory classes in one of 13 educational institutions in the United States. In addition to questions concerning AP ability and family history, we attempted to establish the nature of the musical training that these students received before the age of 7. Some types of early childhood education are designed with the express purpose of developing AP ability. These include the Yamaha method, the Royal College method, and other methods termed ``®xed do. '' ``Fixed do'' pedagogy expressly associates solfeÂge syllables (do-re-mi, etc.) with particular standard pitches: for example ``do'' is always C, ``sol'' is always G. Other types of training are more geared to the development of overall musicality, and emphasize the development of relative pitch ability, with minimal if any attempt to train for absolute pitch recognition. These include the Suzuki method, and other ``moveable do'' techniques. ``Moveable do'' pedagogy associates solfeÂge syllables with a scalar function within a key, so that ``do'' can associate with different pitches, depending on the key being utilized for the training exercise. Instrumental music lessons generally place no emphasis on absolute pitch ability, and we did not categorize them as part of ``®xed do'' pedagogy, although of course, practice on most instruments does reinforce the association of particular note names with speci®c pitches. We also asked about other forms of exposure to music, such as the presence of a parent or sib who either studied or taught music in the home. Respondents were speci®cally asked to indicate which of these types of exposure to music they had received before the age of 7. The overall rate of AP in this population was 12.2%. Similar to results we reported previously [Gregersen et al., 1999], there was a markedly increased rate of AP among Asian students (42/80; 47.5%) compared with Caucasian students (75/834; 9.0%). The relatively higher rate in Asians was present among all the major ethnic subgroups Japanese (26% AP), Korean (37% AP) and Chinese (65% AP). One possible explanation for this difference might be that early childhood music exposure is more frequent in Asian students. There was no signi®cant difference, however, between these two ethnic groups, with 80% of Asians and 71% of Caucasians reporting early music exposure of at least some type (P0.09). When the type of early childhood music training was compared, however, Asians were signi®cantly more likely to have been exposed to early training based on ``®xed do'' techniques compared with Caucasians (29% vs. 6.0%, P0.001). We also performed a logistic regression using different types of early childhood music training among *Correspondence to: Peter K. Gregersen, M.D., Division of Biology and Human Genetics, North Shore University Hospital, 350 Community Drive, Manhasset, NY 11030. E-mail: peterg@nshs.edu