He Absolute Hearing also know as perfect earrefers to the ability to identify the frequency of an isolated auditory stimulus without the aid of a referential auditory stimulus (Moulton, 2014), therefore, it could be defined informally as the ability to read sounds.
An example of absolute pitch can be seen in great musical geniuses such as Mozart, Bach and Tchaikovsky or through contemporaries such as Stevie Wonder.
What abilities do people with Absolute Hearing possess?
It can be stated that Absolute Hearing is an ability that modifies the brain functioning of those who possess it (Veloso and Guimaraes, 2013), therefore, these people have shown various skills, such as:
What is the estimated prevalence of people with Absolute Hearing?
The occurrence of people with Absolute Hearing is rare, the estimated prevalence is estimated to be 1 subject per 10,000 people, in addition to being more commonly observed in musicians with formal training (Veloso and Guimaraes, 2013).
It may seem much more common to us to have Absolute Hearing than the statistics show, but this may probably be because it tends to be confused with the Relative Hearing because there are people who are capable of playing a song just after having heard it once, but if to play such a melody they need a first reference tone of that same instrument, it is no longer about Absolute Ear but rather Relative Ear.
He Relative Hearing is the ability to identify sounds with the help of a reference, a previous note in the case of music, however, people with Absolute Hearing are able to “capture” that note in a vacuum (Moulton, 2014). An example of this is the following: Let’s imagine that a person plays the musical note “D” with any instrument; The person with Absolute Hearing will identify that auditory frequency and identify it as a “D” without any previous reference note, but the person with Relative Hearing will probably not get it right because they will need a second musical note to establish the first tone. .
What factors is Absolute Hearing due to? Are we born with it or, on the contrary, can it be acquired?
Currently this topic generates a lot of controversy, since its origin is not known for certain Certain studies believe that this ability is due to an innate talent based on genetics, while others believe that the acquisition of Absolute Hearing requires early preparation during a critical period of development (between 2-5 years) associated with the development of language. and without taking into account genetic predisposition (Veloso and Guimaraes, 2013).
According to this approach, one can propose a influence of both aspects that is, a confluence of genetic factors of the development of the human brain together with environmental factors and early exposure.
Currently, cognitive neuroscience continues to investigate brain functions related to musical perception and production, trying to locate new neural substrates and genetic correlations. Likewise, thanks to the support of neuroimaging technologies, such research is increasing; however, this fact, for the moment, remains an open question.
