It is said here that 1 in 10,000 people have absolute pitch. I wonder if there is any serious poll that could confirm this.
Do you know any study that could tell how common/uncommon it is to have absolute pitch ?
asked Aug 20, 2012 at 17:23
-
It certainly gets expressed much more often among musicians, in my experience.– user45266Commented Nov 18, 2019 at 20:19
Add a comment
|
2 Answers
Those numbers are a rough estimate, and only applies to US citizens.
Wikipedia has a thorough overview of the relevant information, here. The most salient points:
- Absolute pitch seems to be a cognitive act. It's a property of our brains, and not our ears
- Most people exhibit some ability or sub-components of absolute pitch
- Absolute pitch appears to be trainable to a very high degree. It can be taught/learned.
- Different populations have different percent exhibition for absolute pitch - some estimates for chinese speaking populations go as high as 40-50%.
So, two answers to your question:
- 1/10000 is a rough estimate for US citizens exhibiting absolute pitch
- Since absolute pitch is trainable, and most people exhibit some components of it, it's unlikely we can get better than a very rough estimate.
answered Aug 22, 2012 at 0:30
-
2Just to support this answer: When you've listened to the same song a million times, you'll probably find yourself humming it, or "hear it" in your head. When you've done this many times you'll often find that you've remembered the pitch correctly. This is also a great way to practice it - to just regularly check if you're humming the right tone by checking it on the piano Commented Aug 22, 2012 at 20:04
-
2Most people asking about "perfect pitch" have this idea that it is genetic and innate. The evidence seems to deny this possibility. It is very difficult to disentangle language and training from the phenomenon.– horatioCommented Aug 28, 2012 at 17:15
-
2@MeaningfulUsername: I am absolutely certain your friends who you think exhibit this have training in it. I know non-professional people who play games trying to guess (named) pitch of notes. The fact is that if one has the words to describe the pitch, they have training. The earliest studies in children suggest that (a) people have a natural ability to identify pitch in some manner, and (b) people who are raised without tonal languages gradually "lose" the ability. Now couple that with the answer above regarding trainability.– horatioCommented Mar 27, 2014 at 15:19
-
1Where do you see me denying personal differences in people? This is the typical binary discussion that many people have about these types of things. "Perfect pitch" is distinct from "fast-processing relative pitch" in every single discussion I have seen on the topic, including scholarly articles. "Better at recognizing pitch" is not Perfect Pitch. The topic here is not about actualizing potentials, it is about how common is something that hasn't been established to exist.– horatioCommented Mar 27, 2014 at 15:40
-
2My point it that might never know because language and training in and of itself is required to test it: the biological facility is not accessible without priming it. I think this differs quite a bit from your summation?– horatioCommented Mar 27, 2014 at 15:55
This is less a music question than a behavioral science question, and there is a self-diagnosed issue with much such research is focused on a sample set that is "WEIRD": Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic.
There is no reason to believe that the proportion of people with perfect pitch in a university with researchers studying the brain, which often has a school of music which might attract people with perfect pitch wanting to participate in scientific studies for pizza money, has any relation to the proportion of the same generally.
answered Mar 29, 2021 at 21:56
