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Although music education researchers often utilize music major status as a single-item proxy variable for musician status—and with this designation presume musical competencies or abilities of research participants—there is a lack of research demonstrating links between status as a music major and those assumed competencies. In this study, we compared undergraduate music majors and non-music majors (N = 237) at the group and individual levels using Goldsmiths Musical Sophistication Index (Gold-MSI), a well-established measure of multiple ways in which people report engaging with music. Comparing group means, we found that music majors scored higher than non-music majors on each Gold-MSI subscale. Moderate distribution overlap suggested that these results should be considered cautiously. A logistic regression analysis further suggested the complexity of using music major status as a single-item measure, given that music major status was only strongly predicted by the musical training subscale. Measures such as Gold-MSI may provide a viable and psychometrically sound way of determining musical sophistication that will allow more granular and refined analyses of studies relating to musical competencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Set amidst an increasingly tense discourse about immigration and substantial pressures on educators, this study examines a three-week fourth-grade social studies unit as taught to a class with a large number of English learners located in a low-income school in the Pacific Northwest. Using ethnographic and sociolinguistic perspectives, we provide evidence of how the teacher leverages a wide array of instructional strategies and scaffolds to build language skills and content knowledge within a fast-paced unit on 19th-century Westward Migration. Embedded within such instruction is the construction of narratives that highlight regional examples of a linguistic and ethnically diverse community and that connect immigration trends on a global scale to local history. These strategies and narratives are then used in a summative lesson about immigration that affirms students' family stories as part of the U.S. history still being written. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue including the population of school music environments, available resources to support school music and differences between orchestra, band and choir.

WE HAVE AMPLE EVIDENCE OF CULTURAL BIAS influencing music cognition in a variety of ways including memory. The purpose of this study was to explore the influence of various musical elements on Westernborn listeners' cross-cultural recognition memory performance. Specifically, we were interested in whether the enculturation effect found in previous studies would be observed when tuning, timbre, texture, and rhythm were equalized in the presentation of music from two different cultures. In addition we wanted to explore the possible influence of music preference on recognition memory performance. Listeners were randomly assigned to hear Western and Turkish music in one of three musical context conditions (full, monophonic, isochronous) and subsequently tested on their recognition memory. Results indicated that memory performance was superior for in-culture music regardless of contextual condition, with no significant correlation between preference and memory performance. This points to the statistical properties of pitch sequences as a possible source of culturally biased responses in music listening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including research in music education, research in human behavior, and elements of music teaching and learning.

The author emphasizes the focus toward data as the heart of the research and understating the important roles of context, design, interpretation, and synthesis, which underscores the reality that, in data-driven research, in which data is the focal point which other elements. Topics discussed include the emergence of online platforms, electronic databases and individually maintained professional profiles and the American Psychological Association's ethical guidelines on data accessibility.

The music learning environment is a context in which fundamental forces and values underlying human musicality may be evident. Social bonding within music-making groups is characterized by a high degree of complexity whereas issues of clarity, accuracy, and coordination remain the focus of learning. Physical and cognitive impairments that compromise music learning opportunities offer a critical test of music's link to social bonding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous researchers have found that both adults and children demonstrate better memory for novel music from their own music culture than from an unfamiliar music culture. It was the purpose of this study to determine whether this “enculturation effect” could be mediated through an extended intensive instructional unit in another culture’s music. Fifth-grade students in four intact general music classrooms (two each at two elementary schools in a large U.S. city) took part in an 8-week curriculum exclusively concentrated on Turkish music. Two additional fifth-grade classes at the same schools served as controls and did not receive the Turkish curriculum. Prior to and following the 8-week unit, all classes completed a music memory test that included Western and Turkish music examples. Comparison of pretest and posttest scores revealed that all participants (N = 110) were significantly more successful overall on the second test administration. Consistent with previous findings, participants were significantly less successful remembering items from the unfamiliar music culture, a result that was consistent across test administrations and between instruction and control groups. It appears that the effect of enculturation on music memory is well established early in life and resistant to modification even through extended instructional approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study explored the role of culture in shaping music perception and memory. We tested the hypothesis that listeners demonstrate different patterns of activation associated with music processing—particularly right frontal cortex—when encoding and retrieving culturally familiar and unfamiliar stimuli, with the latter evoking broader activation consistent with more complex memory tasks. Subjects (n = 16) were right-handed adults born and raised in the USA (n = 8) or Turkey (n = 8) with minimal music training. Using fMRI procedures, we scanned subjects during two tasks: (i) listening to novel musical examples from their own culture and an unfamiliar culture and (ii) identifying which among a series of brief excerpts were taken from the longer examples. Both groups were more successful remembering music of their home culture. We found greater activation for culturally unfamiliar music listening in the left cerebellar region, right angular gyrus, posterior precuneus and right middle frontal area extending into the inferior frontal cortex. Subjects demonstrated greater activation in the cingulate gyrus and right lingual gyrus when engaged in recall of culturally unfamiliar music. This study provides evidence for the influence of culture on music perception and memory performance at both a behavioral and neurological level. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this article, the author discusses the impact of culture on musical thinking and learning. Topics discussed include role of cultural identity as substrate for systematic observations according to neuroscientist Robert Turner, need of research for understanding music education and role of gender for studying professional identities of music teachers. Other topics include role of gender distribution in music education research.

In this study, the authors examined whether a conductor's use of high-expressivity or low-expressivity techniques affected evaluations of ensemble performances that were identical across conducting conditions. Two conductors each conducted two 1-minute parallel excerpts from Percy Grainger's Walking Tune. Each directed one excerpt using high-and one using low-expressivity techniques. After watching a video of the four conducting segments set to a single audio performance of the selection by a university wind ensemble, participants (N = 118) evaluated ensemble expressivity using a 10-point Likert-type scale. Half of the participants also rated the expressivity of the conductor using a second identical scale. Ensemble expressivity was rated significantly higher for the high-expressivity conductors; effect size was strong (partial T|2 = .57). Among participants evaluating both conductor and ensemble, there was a significant moderate correlation between ratings (r = .56). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors replicate and extend findings from previous studies of music enculturation by comparing music memory performance of children to that of adults when listening to culturally familiar and unfamiliar music. Forty-three children and 50 adults, all born and raised in the United States, completed a music memory test comprising unfamiliar excerpts of Western and Turkish classical music. Examples were selected at two levels of difficulty — simple and complex — based on texture, instrument variety, presence of simultaneous musical lines, and clarity of internal repetition. All participants were significantly better at remembering novel music from their own culture than from an unfamiliar culture. Simple examples from both cultures were remembered significantly better than complex examples. Children performed as well as adults when remembering simple music from both cultures, whereas adults were better at remembering complex Western music. The results provide evidence that enculturation affects one's understanding of music structure before adulthood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

THE PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY WAS TO TEST THE cross-cultural musical understanding of trained and untrained listeners from two distinct musical cultures by exploring the influence of enculturation on musical memory performance. Trained and untrained participants (N = 150) from the United States and Turkey listened to a series of novel musical excerpts from both familiar and unfamiliar cultures and then completed a recognition memory task for each set of examples. All participants were significantly better at remembering novel music from their native culture and there were no performance differences based on musical expertise. In addition, Turkish participants were better at remembering Western music, a familiar but nonnative musical culture, than Chinese music. The results suggest that our cognitive schemata for musical information are culturally derived and that enculturation influences musical memory at a structural level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The lineage of academic research journals can be traced back over 350 years. Oldenburg was the first editor of I Philosophic Transactions i and penned those words in what I like to imagine as the distant ancestor of essays like this Forum. For the past eight years, six as editor, I have been awed by the nuance, eloquence, power, and precision of researchers from around the globe who have contributed to the I JRME i . [Extracted from the article]

As a forum for research on music teaching and learning, the I Journal of Research in Music Education i features studies that consider a broad spectrum of human musical interactions. The nuanced integration between the musical and the social facets of musical activity comes through clearly in reports of students' experiences with group music participation (described within three different contexts by [2], [3], and [6]. More specifically speaking to Dewey's case and that of other individuals to whom musical engagement is less than its fullest, it is important as educators to gain better understanding of the full range of musical interactions and the multiple dimensions along which these interactions occur. [Extracted from the article]

The new year brings several changes and innovations that will be consequential for readers, authors, and the editorial and production teams of the I Journal of Research in Music Education i . In that configuration, the conference coincided with the nomination and selection of new I JRME i editorial board members; nominations were submitted before the conference and the current editorial and SRME boards met during the conference to review the nominations and to select incoming members. The new conference schedule necessitated either a change in timeline for editorial board appointments or a decoupling of the conference and board selection process. [Extracted from the article]

In this study, we examined effectiveness of recorded models in the context of ensemble rehearsals. Over a 5-week treatment period, directors of three middle/junior high and two high school bands systematically included professional recordings as part of their preparation of selected pieces. Students completed weekly self-evaluation reports assessing their individual progress and their ensembles' progress on model and no-model pieces. Using numerical and free-response formats, students evaluated self-achievement and ensemble achievement on notes/rhythms, articulation/dynamics, tuning, and balance. Expert evaluations revealed no difference in achievement between model and no-model pieces on pretreatment and posttreatment performance recordings. Student evaluations showed more modest achievement gains for model pieces. High school students demonstrated more positive self-evaluations for their own versus their ensembles' performance and greater overall differentiation in their evaluations across time. Middle school/junior high students were significantly more positive toward the model pieces. All students provided a greater number of free-response comments for model pieces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The popular view of music as a “universal” language ignores the privileged position of the cultural insider in comprehending musical information unique to their own tradition. The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis that listeners would demonstrate different neural activity in response to culturally familiar and unfamiliar music and that those differences may be affected by the extent of subjects'' formal musical training. Just as familiar languages have been shown to use distinct brain processes, we hypothesized that an analogous difference might be found in music and that it may depend in part on subjects'' formal musical knowledge. Using fMRI we compared the activation patterns of professional musicians and untrained controls reared in the United States as they listened to music from their culture (Western) and from an unfamiliar culture (Chinese). No overall differences in activation were observed for either subject group in response to the two musical styles, although there were differences in recall performance based on style and there were activation differences based on training. Trained listeners demonstrated additional activation in the right STG for both musics and in the right and left midfrontal regions for Western music and Chinese music, respectively. Our findings indicate that listening to culturally different musics may activate similar neural resources but with dissimilar results in recall performance. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Discusses the existence of a musical culture in ensembles. Strengths of school ensembles; Significant way of comprehending culture according to ethnomusicologist Bruno Nettl; Cultural themes that manifest in the school ensemble.

Examines the impact of music on the intellectual development of human beings. Presence of musical brains in human beings; Discussion of the Mozart effect; Connection between musical structure and cognitive activity; Awareness of music educators on the relevance of musical research on music education practice.

Focuses on the relationship between music and academic achievement. Performance of music students in academics and student leadership; Study of the social and academic life of the American tenth-grader by the National Center for Educational Statistics; Measurement of music students' academic performance.

An editorial is presented which offers questions that could illuminate the complex environment of the performance-based music classroom. Topics discussed include expressive conducting which would demonstrate any perceived impact on the ensemble teaching context which has been found to be related to evaluations of ensemble performances; and concludes to interpret findings of accomplished music skill through one's ability to conduct expressively.

An introduction is presented which discusses change to the journal's subscription policy, practice of music teaching and learning, and advancement of music teaching.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses topics from the issue, such as ethnomusicology, research on music education, and teaching and learning instrumental music.

To coincide with the new academic year many NAfME members are now enjoying, it is a pleasure to introduce a new recurring feature for readers of the I Journal of Research in Music Education i : special topic collections. What distinguishes music participants from non-participants? The goal of these collections is to provide a convenient and substantive resource to which music educators can turn to gain an initial overview of a specific area of concern or curiosity. [Extracted from the article]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including professional knowledge and development; music teachers; music teaching profession.

An introduction is presented with topics including impact of budget decision on music teacher staffing in Midwestern U.S. school district, and impact of localized factors on the status of music programs.

An introduction is presented in which the editor talks about the periodical's use of an impact factor for journal metrics, the periodical's inclusion in the "Social Sciences Citation Index" in 2016, the slow pace of research in music education, and goal to be a leading scholarly publication.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including teaching in music classes, investigation on vocal production mechanism by Rebecca Atkins and examination of music-contextualized data through the lens of a domain-general construct.

The article offers information on the biennial meeting of the periodical "Journal of Research in Music Education" in conjunction with National Association for Music Education (NAfME) Music Research and Teacher Education National Conference in Atlanta, Georgia. Topics include task of editorial board to review nominations of new members of the editorial committee, music learning opportunities, and music education in the U.S.

The article reports on the release of 100 research studies by a consortium of researchers in psychology, which first appeared in leading journals in 2008. Topics discussed include need to include replication as a required component of doctoral study, dissemination of replicated research in forums provided by scholarly community, and role of authors in providing documentation through established data repositories.

The article focuses on research paper that lie within the scope of music education. Topics discussed include discipline of music education that utilizes scholarly discourse and inquire to examine the ways in which individuals are and have become musical; study of music learning in all forms; human music learning as a learning more than the music teaching profession; interaction of the teacher and the learner; and research that addresses fundamental aspects of human musicality.

The article examines field experiences of professional music educators using two studies. Topics discussed include a longitudinal examination conducted by Sarah Bartolome of students experiences with multiple field-based activities and the impact of skills acquired by the students within their first year of teaching; and the analysis of students who developed the specific skill of lesson planning within the field experience.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses hypothesis testing procedures, data collection, assessment and quantitative research.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses the prevalence of hazing behaviors in college marching bands.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including a music research, impact of infants interaction with music on musical behavior, and ongoing value for common educational outcomes.

The article discusses developments in the periodical including the author as editor, resignation of editorial board members Robert Gillespie, Joyce Gromko, and Michael Hewitt, and appointment of William Bauer, Kenneth Elpus, and Lisa Koops as member of the editorial board.

The article focuses on personal changes in members of the Journal of Research in Music Education (JRME) editorial board include departure of several colleagues such as Mary Kennedy, Carl Hancock and Don Coffman and appointment of new members such as Colleen Conway, Frank Diaz and Jessica Nápoles.

Agriculture is essential for providing food and maintaining food security while concurrently delivering multiple other ecosystem services. However, agricultural systems are generally a net source of greenhouse gases and ammonia. They, therefore, need to substantively contribute to climate change mitigation and net zero ambitions. It is widely acknowledged that there is a need to further reduce and mitigate emissions across sectors, including agriculture to address the climate emergency and emissions gap. This discussion paper outlines a collation of opinions from a range of experts within agricultural research and advisory roles following a greenhouse gas and ammonia emission mitigation workshop held in the UK in March 2022. The meeting identified the top mitigation priorities within the UK's agricultural sector to achieve reductions in greenhouse gases and ammonia that are compatible with policy targets. In addition, experts provided an overview of what they believe are the key knowledge gaps, future opportunities and co-benefits to mitigation practices as well as indicating the potential barriers to uptake for mitigation scenarios discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: Good management of hygiene is required to minimise the risk of disease transmission in pre-weaned calf rearing facilities. In this study, calf rearing facilities were surveyed and samples of feed, bedding and feeding equipment were collected as they are likely sources of infection in calves. These samples were analysed for hygiene indicators including total viable count (TVC), coliforms (TCC) and Escherichia coli and compared with pre-defined target levels for each of these indicators. Use of automatic feeders rather than manually mixed milk replacer or cow's milk led to an increased likelihood of the milk/milk replacer TVC being within target levels, and solid feed was less likely to contain E. coli when sampled from group pen buckets compared with single pens. Water samples from self-fill drinkers were more likely to contain high TVC than samples from manually filled drinkers, and single pens were more likely to have high TCC than group pens. Drinker and pen type were confounded though, with all the self-fill drinkers located in group pens. Cleaning milk feeders after every feed reduced the chance of high TVC levels, and high levels of TVC in feeders were linked to high levels in milk mixing utensils. Bedding was more likely to contain target TVC and TCC levels in group than in single pens. This may reflect differences in space allowance and floor type between group and individual pens. The results showed variation of hygiene levels across farms and highlighted several associated management and housing factors. Pre-weaned dairy calves are very susceptible to disease in the first months of life due to having a naïve immune system and because of the numerous physiological stressors they face. Hygiene management is a key element in minimizing enteric disease risk in calves by reducing their exposure to pathogens. Samples of milk, concentrate feed and drinking water, boot swabs of bedding and swabs of feed equipment were collected from 66 dairy farms as part of a survey of calf rearing practice and housing design. All the samples were cultured to determine total viable counts (TVC), total coliforms (TCC) and Escherichia coli as indicators of hygiene. Target ranges for levels of TVC, TCC and E. coli were defined from the literature and the sample results compared against them. The TVC targets in milk, MR and water were <4.0 log10 CFU/mL. TCC and E. coli targets of <1.1 log10 CFU/mL (the detection limit) were used for milk, MR, concentrate feed and feeding equipment. For water, the TCC and E. coli targets were <1.0 log10 CFU/100 mL. The targets used for bedding boot swabs were <6.3 log10 TVC CFU/mL and <5.7 log10 TCC or E. coli CFU/mL. Farm management factors were included as fixed effects in a generalized linear mixed model to determine the probability of samples being within each hygiene indicator target range. Milk replacer samples obtained from automatic feeders were more likely to be within the TVC target range (0.63 probability) than those prepared manually (0.34) or milk samples taken from the bulk tank (0.23). Concentrate feed samples taken from buckets in single-calf pens were more likely to have E. coli detected (0.89) than samples taken from group pen troughs (0.97). A very small proportion of water samples were within the indicator targets (TVC 9.8%, TCC 6.0%, E. coli 10.2%). Water from self-fill drinkers had a lower likelihood of being within the TVC target (0.03) than manually filled buckets (0.14), and water samples from single pens were more likely to be within TCC target ranges (0.12) than those from group pens (0.03). However, all self-fill drinkers were located in group pens so these results are likely confounded. Where milk feeders were cleaned after every feed, there was a greater likelihood of being within the TVC target range (0.47, compared with 0.23 when not cleaned after every feed). Detection of coliforms in milk replacer mixing utensils was linked with reduced probability of TVC (0.17, compared with 0.43 when coliforms were not detected) and TCC (0.38, compared with 0.62), which was within target in feeders. Key factors related to increased probability of bedding samples being within TCC target range were use of group calf pens (0.96) rather than single-calf pens (0.80), use of solid floors (0.96, compared with 0.76 for permeable floors) and increased space allowance of calves (0.94 for pens with ≥2 m2/calf, compared with 0.79 for pens with <2 m2/calf). Bedding TVC was more likely to be within the target range in group (0.84) rather than in single pens (0.66). The results show that hygiene levels in the calf rearing environment vary across farms and that management and housing design impact hygiene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authors of previous research have reported that U.S. English language learner (ELL) students participate in school-sponsored music ensembles (band, orchestra, and choir) at a lower rate than their native-English-speaking peers (non-ELLs). The current study examined this phenomenon using a nationally representative sample of U.S. 10th graders (14- to 16-year-olds across 751 high schools, N = 15,011) to estimate school music ensemble participation rates for ELL and non-ELL students. Consistent with prior research, initial results indicated that individual ELL status was a significant, negative predictor of participation. However, when our analyses took into account student socioeconomic status and academic achievement, results provided no evidence that ELL students participate in ensembles at different rates than non-ELL students. Results also indicate that school membership accounted for different ensemble participation rates. It may be that lack of opportunity—not lack of interest—explains the gap between ELL and non-ELL music participation that has been observed in prior research. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this case study, we investigate upper elementary teachers' decision-making practices regarding grouping configurations and purposes set for small group instruction (SGI) across content areas. Five experienced teachers working in linguistically and culturally diverse settings participated in this study. Data analyses with regard to student grouping revealed that, depending on the subject area, tasks, and "nonacademic" considerations, teachers navigated among multiple SGI setups, including similar- and mixed-ability groups, performance- or current-needs-based groups, and—unique to one teacher—a fluid-stable configuration. Data analyses with regard to purposes for SGI instruction revealed that although targeting disciplinary literacy was the main reason for SGI, it also served as a tool for (a) gauging students' needs and how students responded to instruction, (b) "hitting" multiple within- and cross-disciplinary targets, and (c) building students' social skills. We refer to these teacher decision-making practices as "organizational fluidity" and "focal fluidity," respectively. Implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study objectives were to: 1) examine how calves of divergent immune status respond to BRSV vaccination at 3 weeks of age; 2) trace glycoprotein E negative BoHV-1 antibodies from vaccinated dams to calf sera and to investigate how passive transfer affects response to live BoHV-1 vaccine at 6 weeks of age; 3) explore the impact of passive transfer status on blood metabolites around weaning. Thirty seven Holstein cows and their calves were included in the study. All cows were immunised with a commercial marker vaccine against BoHV-1(gE-) administered intra-muscularly at 4 month prior to the start of calving. Calves were assigned to 1 of 2 colostrum treatment groups: 1) 5% of BW in colostrum fed at birth, or 2) 10% of BW in colostrum fed at birth. Calves were also immunised at 3 weeks of age with a respiratory commercial vaccine, and a booster administered 4 weeks later. Calves were also immunised against BoHV-1 at 6 weeks of age, using one dose of a live commercial vaccine. The results demonstrated that level of passive immunity had no effect on immune response to vaccination and the importance of feeding colostrum from vaccinated BoHV-1 gE- dams to provide calves with passive protection against IBRV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]