SEASHORE MEASURES OF MUSICAL TALENT 59 



have real prognostic value. Herein lies the greatest scientific value of the 

 Seashore tests. Shall we then say that musical capacities as measured by 

 the Seashore tests reach a certain degree when one becomes an adult with 

 no significant variation after that time? Evidence herein presented sub- 

 stantiates an affirmative answer, but this question will again be considered 

 in further discussion of this fact in a forthcoming study by the writers on the 

 retests and re-retests of children after musical training. 



"The correlations (Pearson r) shown for each of the five tests in table 1, 

 range from + .45 in the time test to -f- .83 in memory. Within the knowledge 

 of the writers there is no published interpretation of correlation values for 

 measurements in which the threshold of hearing is involved, apart from 

 intelligence tests, vocational tests, et cetera. It is suggested that correla- 

 tions for these measurements be interpreted with some consideration of this 

 factor (threshold of hearing). At best there is a wide divergence in the 

 interpretation of correlation values for any tests." 



The discussion up to this time which has referred to raw scores only will 

 now be directed to the centile ranks obtained by these music degree students. 

 In the group of 157 students, 103 of these were entrants in the first four 

 years of the school's organization, hence they were not subjected to as 

 exacting a curriculum as were the remaining group of 54 students who 

 entered after that time. For this reason the 54 students were considered 

 separately to discover if possible whether or not their greater discipline 

 mentally and musically would produce a greater positive variation in the 

 test results than was found for the somewhat less disciplined group of 103 

 students. Before proceeding to the discussion of centile ranks for the split 

 group, the writer wishes to take a moment to cite the average variation in 

 units of raw scores in T 2 over Ti for the more disciplined group of 54 stu- 

 dents. These are: —0.1 in pitch, + 1.6 in intensity, +1.8 in time, +2.1 in 

 consonance, and +3.0 in memory. While all but one is a positive variation, 

 none exceed the normal fluctuation span of ±3 units established for the 

 whole group. The increase of T2 over Ti is not sufficient to conclude that 

 the more rigid training and education experienced by this group produces 

 any significant improvement in the Seashore tests. 



When test scores are transferred to centile ranks according to the adult 

 norms, each student's musical capacities are expressed in the form of a 

 talent profile. All centile ranks for each test were averaged in order to 

 present the talent profile for each group of students. In figure 3 these group 

 talent profiles are presented for T x (solid line) and T 2 (dotted line) for the 

 split groups of 54 students and 103 students respectively and for the total 

 group of 157 students. It is apparent that at the time of the first tests the 



