Musical Role Asymmetries in Piano Duet Performance Influence Alpha-Band Neural Oscillation and Behavioral Synchronization.

Recent work in interpersonal coordination has revealed that neural oscillations, occurring spontaneously in the human brain, are modulated during the sensory, motor, and cognitive processes involved in interpersonal interactions. In particular, alpha-band (8-12 Hz) activity, linked to attention in general, is related to coordination dynamics and empathy traits. Researchers have also identified an association between each individual's attentiveness to their co-actor and the relative similarity in the co-actors' roles, influencing their behavioral synchronization patterns.

Performance monitoring of self and other in a turn-taking piano duet: A dual-EEG study.

During joint action tasks, expectations for outcomes of one's own and other's actions are collectively monitored. Recent evidence suggests that trait empathy levels may also influence performance monitoring processes. The present study investigated how outcome expectation and empathy interact during a turn-taking piano duet task, using simultaneous electroencephalography (EEG) recording.

Neural representation of a melodic motif: Effects of polyphonic contexts.

In music, a melodic motif is often played repeatedly in different pitch ranges and at different times. Event-related potential (ERP) studies have shown that the mismatch negativity (MMN) reflects memory trace processing that encodes two separate melodic lines ("voices") with different motifs. Here we investigated whether a single motif presented in two voices is encoded as a single entity or two separate entities, and whether motifs overlapping in time impede or enhance encoding strength.

Computer-Tailored Student Support in Introductory Physics.

Large introductory courses are at a disadvantage in providing personalized guidance and advice for students during the semester. We introduce E2Coach (an Expert Electronic Coaching system), which allows instructors to personalize their communication with thousands of students. We describe the E2Coach system, the nature of the personalized support it provides, and the features of the students who did (and did not) opt-in to using it during the first three terms of its use in four introductory physics courses at the University of Michigan.