I sent this on to one of the younger members of our faculty, and here's her reply:
"The only problem is that song has been wildly popular since it was featured in the movie "Pitch Perfect" (where they sang in glee-club style and the lyrics are more easily decipherable). I love the concept, though, because I'm always messing up the lyrics to songs." Geez, she's way too "hip" for my current musical knowledge. But I suggested that it could be done when a brand-new song comes out, or even an older one like "Louie, Louie." Remember everyone claiming they "knew" what the "real" words were?? This generation would be unlikely to have heard it... Beth Benoit Plymouth State University New Hampshire On Tue, Nov 11, 2014 at 10:30 AM, Michael Britt <mich...@thepsychfiles.com> wrote: > > > > > > > What do you think of this idea for a simple psych experiment: we all know > how hard it is at times to understand the lyrics of a song, however, it can > be easier to understand the lyrics when we know the title of the song or > the context of the song (the song is about “love" or the song is about > “Loss”, etc.). Since my kids force me to listen to their music over and > over again, here’s a song in which the lyrics (to me at least) are nearly > impossible to understand. I had to “google” them to figure it out - it’s > called “Titanium”. > > An excerpt of the song can be found here in iTunes: > https://soundcloud.com/thepsychfiles/anonymous-song-excerpt > > However, I have pulled out 3 seconds of the song in which the singer sings > these words, “ghost town and haunted love”. She sings them, in my opinion, > so lazily that you can’t figure out what she’s saying. > > The 3 second segment can be heard here: > https://soundcloud.com/thepsychfiles/anonymous-song-excerpt > > So there’s the study: > > > 1. Recruit participants who have never heard this song > 2. Randomly assign one group of subjects to listen to the 3 second > segment and don’t tell them anything about what the song is about. Ask them > to write down what they think the lyrics are > 3. The second group of subjects listens to the same 3 second segment, > but you tell them that the song is about halloween. > 4. Dependent variable: since the participants' responses are open > ended, experimenters will have to code the responses as to "degree of > correctness” to the actual lyric. > > > Hopefully, the “priming” of the word “halloween” will provide a context > for correctly interpreting the lyrics. > > What do you think? > > Michael > > Michael A. Britt, Ph.D. > mich...@thepsychfiles.com > http://www.ThePsychFiles.com > Twitter: @mbritt > > > --- > > You are currently subscribed to tips as: beth.ben...@gmail.com. > > To unsubscribe click here: > http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13105.b9b37cdd198e940b73969ea6ba7aaf72&n=T&l=tips&o=39970 > > (It may be necessary to cut and paste the above URL if the line is broken) > > or send a blank email to > leave-39970-13105.b9b37cdd198e940b73969ea6ba7aa...@fsulist.frostburg.edu > > > > > --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@mail-archive.com. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=39973 or send a blank email to leave-39973-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
