Psychomusicology: Music, Mind & Brain
2011, Vol. 21, No. 1 & No. 2
© 2012 by Psychomusicology
DOI: 10.1037/h0094005
Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’
creation of happy and sad songs
M ay u m i A dac h i
Hokkaido University
S a n dr a E . T r e h u b
University of Toronto & Université de Montréal
a b s t r ac t—Canadian and Japanese 4- and 5-yearold children were asked to create a happy song or a sad
song. Approximately 60% of Canadian preschoolers produced a song under these circumstances in contrast to
roughly 40% of Japanese preschoolers. Of the Japanese
children who produced a song, most simply reproduced
a familiar song. By contrast, Canadian children typically included novel words, melodies, or both. The lyrics
of Canadian children’s happy songs focused on candy,
friends, family, and vigorous physical activity. Their
sad lyrics focused on thwarted goals and the absence
of family and friends. Their happy melodies showed
influences of the major mode, along with dotted or syncopated rhythms, whereas their sad songs showed suppressed melodic range and contour. Japanese children
made much less use of emotion words or emotion-evoking events in their happy or sad songs. We discuss socialization and early music education differences across
cultures that may contribute to the observed differences.
toddlerhood, with mother and child taking turns at
improvising song variations (Umezawa, 1990, cited
in Adachi, 1994).
Young children generate idiosyncratic songs
for communicative purposes such as stopping a
baby brother from touching food (Omi, 1994).
These spontaneous songs, or “musical utterances”
(Campbell, 1998, p. 67), often trigger improvised
musical exchanges among friends, who repeat,
modify, and extend the melodic motif while
transmitting ideas and messages to each other
(Campbell, 1998, pp. 28-30; Whiteman, 2001).
Although preschoolers successfully communicate
verbal instructions in their invented songs, it is
unclear whether they can create songs to convey
distinct emotional messages.
Much research on the communication of emotion
in music has focused on musicians’ contrastive
performances (e.g., happy, sad) of the same piece
of music or on listeners’ perception of the intended
emotion (Gabrielsson & Juslin, 1996; Juslin, 1997;
Juslin & Sloboda, 2001; Ohgushi & Hattori, 1996;
Senju & Ohgushi, 1987). By contrast, relatively few
studies have explored how musically untrained
adults (Yamasaki, 2002) and children communicate
emotion in their musical performances (Adachi,
2000; Adachi & Trehub, 1998, 1999a; Umemoto,
1994; Yamasaki, 2006). Such research has indicated that untrained Japanese adults and young
children (5- to 6-year-olds) use variations in loudness and tempo to express happiness, sadness, and
anger in their improvised percussion performances
k e y wo r d s —invented song, emotion, preschool children, cross-cultural
Although there has been considerable investigation
of preschool children’s singing of invented and standard songs (e.g., Campbell, 1998; Davidson, 1985;
Davidson, McKernon, & Gardner, 1981; Davidson
& Scripp, 1994; Dowling, 1984; Kelley & SuttonSmith, 1987; McKernon, 1979; Moog, 1968/1976;
Moorhead & Pond, 1941, 1942; Omi, 1994), relatively little is known about the communication of
expressive intentions in their singing. In musically
oriented homes, mothers often convey information
to toddlers in the context of improvised songs, and
toddlers respond by joining the “singing conversation” (Kelley & Sutton-Smith, 1987). These
sung exchanges are likely to continue beyond
Mayumi Adachi, Department of Psychology, Hokkaido
University. Sandra E. Trehub, University of Toronto & Université de
Montréal.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed
to: Mayumi Adachi, Department of Psychology, Hokkaido
University, N10 W7, Kita-ku, Sapporo, 060-0810, Japan. E-mail:
[email protected]
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Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
(Yamasaki, 2002, 2006). In addition to variations in
loudness and tempo, Canadian children 4-12 years
of age vary pitch level and tone of voice to distinguish happy from sad versions of a familiar song
(Adachi & Trehub, 1998).
In their invented songs, Canadian 6- to 12-yearolds express happiness by means of dotted or
syncopated rhythms, and they express sadness by
means of isochronous rhythms, legato articulation,
and affectively negative lyrics (Adachi & Trehub,
1999a, 1999b). Japanese 8- to 10-year-olds vary
tempo, loudness, rhythm, and interval size to generate distinctive melodies to go with prescribed happy
and sad lyrics, but the melodies generated by 5- and
6-year-olds are unrelated to the emotions expressed
in the lyrics (Umemoto, 1999, pp. 56-57).
In the present investigation we sought to ascertain how preschool children use lyrics and melodies
to convey happiness and sadness through their
invented songs. Although preschoolers seem to be
capable of creating songs (Campbell, 1998; Kelley
& Sutton-Smith, 1987; McKernon, 1979; Moog,
1968/1976; Moorhead & Pond, 1941, 1942; Omi,
1994), it is unclear whether they can express their
emotional intentions consistently or conventionally
in such songs. Although Japanese 5- and 6-year-olds
failed to use distinctive melodic features for happy
and sad lyrics (Umemoto, 1994), the provision of set
lyrics may have interfered with their performance.
Children in the present study had complete flexibility with the lyrics and melodies of their invented
songs.
We explored the expression of emotion in
invented songs by preschoolers from Canada
(Experiment 1) and Japan (Experiment 2). The
focus on North American and Japanese children
had the potential to reveal differences arising from
contrasting cultural values such as individualism
versus collectivism (Stephan, Stephan, Saito, &
Barnett, 1998), different display rules and attitudes
about self-expression (Pittam, Gallois, Iwawaki, &
Kroonenberg, 1995; Safdar et al., 2009), different
socialization practices (Abe & Izard, 1999; Hayashi,
Karasawa, & Tobin, 2009), and different systems of
music education (Adachi & Chino, 2004). In contrast
to North American children, who are socialized to
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value the expression of emotion in public, Japanese
children are encouraged to develop robust boundaries between their private and public persona
(Barnlund, 1975; Doi, 1986; La Voy et al., 2001). That
may be why Japanese children’s figure drawings are
less likely to include smiles than those of American
children (La Voy et al., 2001). One might also expect
more muted musical expressiveness from Japanese
preschoolers than from Canadian preschoolers.
experiment 1
In previous research, 6- to 12-year-old Canadian children created happy and sad songs by manipulating
the lyrics and expressive performing style (Adachi
& Trehub, 1999b). Their sad songs exhibited more
legato articulation than their happy songs regardless of children’s age, sex, or singing ability. Older
girls (11- to 12-year-olds) used dotted or syncopated
rhythms, and the more proficient singers capitalized
on modality (i.e., major for happiness and minor
for sadness). To some extent, then, school-aged
Canadian children made use of emotional expressive devices that are conventional in Western art
music (e.g., Juslin, 1997, 2001). Our goal in the present experiment was to examine younger Canadian
children’s free expression of happiness and sadness
in lyrics and melodies.
Method
Participants
The participants in the present experiment were
part of a larger investigation of the development of
expressive singing in Canadian children 4-12 years
of age (for details, see Adachi & Trehub, 1998).
Although the original sample included 83 Canadian
preschoolers 4-5 years of age from middle-class
families, technical difficulties reduced the available
sample to 66 preschoolers. Of those 66 children, 40
of them, 14 boys (M = 4.50 years, SD = .52) and 26
girls (M = 4.42 years old, SD = .50), provided material for detailed auditory analysis in the present
study.
Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’ happy and sad songs
Apparatus and Procedure
Testing was conducted in a sound-attenuating
room with only the child and a female tester present. To make the room friendly to young children,
some color drawings of animal characters were
pasted on the wall. VHS recordings were made with
a Panasonic VW-1500 camera, and separate digital
audio-recordings were made with a Sony TCD-D7
recorder and a Sony ECM-95A microphone. Of the
66 preschoolers, 35 were instructed to make up a
happy song and 31 to make up a sad song. To assist
them with this task, children were presented with
a picture of a rabbit displaying the target emotion,
and were asked to describe how the rabbit was feeling and why the rabbit was feeling that way. After
children identified the target emotion (i.e., feeling
happy or sad), they were asked to make up a happy
(or sad) song that would sound just like the way
the rabbit was feeling. Substantial encouragement
and prompting (but no provision of specific ideas)
were given to children who exhibited difficulty
with the task. On average, children who completed
the task took 2 min or less to do so. By contrast,
those who showed initial difficulty generally failed
to complete the task despite the encouragement
offered.
Content analysis of lyrics
A native speaker of Canadian English who was
familiar with children’s songs transcribed the lyrics
of each song. These transcriptions were confirmed
independently by a second native speaker of English.
The following aspects of the lyrics were coded
categorically.
1. Type of lyrics. The lyrics were coded as “known”
if they reproduced those of an existing song, as
“variation” if they consisted of modifications of the
lyrics of an existing song, as “original/personal”
if the lyrics were original and depicted the child’s
everyday experience, and as “original/others” if
the original lyrics included make-believe stories or
incantations.
2. Positive emotion words. This category was coded
“present” if the lyrics contained one or more positive
emotion words such as happy, glad, fun, good, laugh,
smile, love, like, favorite, delicious, clean, and thank you.
Otherwise, it was coded “absent.”
3. Negative emotion words. This category was
coded “present” if the lyrics contained one or more
negative emotion words such as sad, scary, lonely,
alone, bad, angry, hate, disappointed, irritated, cry, sorry,
and separated. Otherwise, it was coded “absent.”
4. Positive emotion-evoking events. This category
was coded “present” if the lyrics contained one or
more descriptions of a positive event (e.g., “Everyone
wanted to play with him.” “A bunny was eating an ice
cream.”). Otherwise, it was coded “absent.”
5. Negative emotion-evoking events. This category
was coded “present” if the target lyrics contained
one or more descriptions of a negative event (e.g.,
“He was bullied.” “He could not play with his
friends.”). Otherwise, it was coded “absent.”
Inter-rater reliability for each coding category
was evaluated by calculating Cohen’s kappa (Siegel
& Castellan, Jr., 1988) between the first author and
an independent rater who coded five happy and
five sad songs (i.e., 25% of songs) that were selected
randomly. High reliabilities were confirmed for all
coding categories (κs = .75-1.0). Coding from the
first author was used for statistical analyses.
Content analysis of melodies
Digital recordings of children’s songs were
converted to acoustical files by means of Sound
Designer II Software (Digidesign). Two music
teachers who had experience with young children
listened to five happy and five sad songs (i.e., 25% of
all songs), confirming that the following categories
could be coded reliably (κs = .69-1.0). Coding from
the first author was used for statistical analyses.
1. Melody type. Each melody was coded as
“known” if it was a nearly exact copy of another song
that the child knew, “variation” if it was a variation
of an existing song, “original rhythm” if its novelty
was primarily rhythmic, and “original melody” if it
featured original pitch and rhythmic patterns.
2. Modality. Most melodies whose modality was
apparent were closer to the major than to the minor
mode. A melody with minor influences was coded
as “minor.” We also coded melodies as “minor”
if they had a flattened or reduced pitch range
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Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
or compressed contour. Melodies were coded as
“unclear” if the modality was not readily identifiable
or if both modalities were evident.
3. Rhythm. A melody was coded as “dotted” if its
rhythm sounded more dotted than isochronous, as
“isochronous” if it sounded more isochronous than
dotted, and as “unclear” if the rhythm was not readily identifiable.
4. Beat. Each melody was coded as “regular” if
the singer held a relatively steady beat throughout,
as “partly regular” if the singer held a relatively
steady beat for a portion of the song, and as “irregular” if there was no evidence of a steady beat.
Results and Discussion
As noted, 40 of the 66 children (60.6%) produced
songs in response to the request for happy or
sad songs. Specifically, 20 of 35 children (57.1%)
produced happy songs, as requested, with the
remaining 15 children producing no song. Moreover,
20 of 31 children (64.5%) produced a sad song in
response to that request, with the remaining 11 children producing no song. All analyses were based on
the 20 happy and 20 sad songs produced by these
children.
Lyrics
Regardless of their intended emotion (happy
or sad), 36 Canadian preschoolers, or 90% of the
sample, produced original lyrics (n = 36). For the
songs with original lyrics, 72.5% (n = 29) featured
animal characters such as a bunny (suggested by the
picture provided) or dinosaur (original/others) and
17.5% (n = 7) featured personal experiences (original/personal). Only 10% (n = 4) of children used
the lyrics of familiar songs, the remaining children
creating variations of familiar lyrics or creating
entirely novel lyrics. Thus, subsequent analyses
of the lyrics included novel lyrics as well as those
borrowed from familiar songs.
Positive emotion words (e.g., happy, love, hug,
kiss) were used more often in happy songs (n = 8)
than in sad songs (n = 2), χ2(1, N = 40) = 4.80, p =
.03. Positive emotion-evoking events were also used
more frequently in happy (n = 6) than in sad (n = 1)
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songs, χ2(1, N = 40) = 4.33, p = .04. Negative emotion
words (e.g., sad, crying, lonely) appeared exclusively
in children’s sad songs (n = 14), χ2(1, N = 40) = 21.54,
p < .0001, but negative emotion-evoking events
occurred more frequency in sad (n = 15) than in
happy songs (n = 3), χ2(1, N = 40) = 14.55, p < .0001.
In Adachi and Trehub (1999a), Canadian 6- to
12-year-olds used positive emotion words or positive emotion-evoking events regardless of the
intended emotion. For preschoolers in the present
study, however, such lyrical devices featured prominently in happy songs. Table 1 depicts examples
of emotion-laden themes in the lyrics of preschoolers’ songs. Positive lyrical themes involving candy,
cake, or ice cream were significantly more frequent
in happy than in sad songs, χ2(1, N = 40) = 11.61,
p = .001. Similarly, actions like hopping, jumping, running, or playing were significantly more
frequent in happy than in sad songs, χ2(1, N = 40) =
5.63, p = .018.
In previous research, death was the prototypical sad theme for older children (Adachi & Trehub,
1999a), but only a single preschooler mentioned
death in the present study (Figure 1). Instead, the
most typical verbal theme in preschoolers’ sad songs
was the blocking of desired actions (i.e., not getting
what you wanted), which appeared in half of the sad
songs (n = 10) but in none of the happy songs, χ2(1, N
= 40) = 13.33, p < .0001. Although friends, family, and
related words (Mom, Dad) occurred in both happy
and sad songs, their usage differed substantially.
For example, happy songs featured family and friends
together with the main character (Figure 2), χ2(1, N
= 40) = 3.75, p = .05, in contrast to sad songs, which
included no family or no friends, χ2(1, N = 40) = 2.06,
p = .15 (see Table 1).
Just as older children sometimes convey happiness or sadness through repetition of emotion words
in their invented songs (Adachi & Trehub, 1999a),
preschoolers did likewise. For example, one 5-yearold girl sang the following: I’m happy, I’m happy. My
friends are happy, too. One 5-year-old boy began his
sad song with similar word repetition and ended
as follows: Sad words, sad words, sad words, sad. Sad
words, sad words, sad words, word. The word was crying
and the other one was laughing. The other one stole his ball
and he started crying. And then he ran.
Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’ happy and sad songs
Table 1
Emotion themes in Canadian preschool children’s lyrics
Theme
Example
Happy lyrics
candy, desserts
*… One day, he gave me a chocolate bar too…
*… it saw ice cream shop…
hopping, jumping, running, playing
*… Happy bunny running in the forest…
*… He hopped all the way to school…
*Bunny rabbit, jump jump…
*The dinosaur went out to play.
friends, family
*… Bunny rabbit, bunny ba.. maked a new friend…
*… ‘N I know that we are a family… I love you, mom, …
Sad lyrics
no friends, no family
*… I have no friends, that’s why I’m lonely…
*… She can’t find her mom or dad or brother or sister...
blocking of desired actions/hope
*… She was so sad because she didn’t get what she wants…
Some preschool children dramatized the
emotional context by means of onomatopoeia and
character dialogue: (1) I was sad from all the day. I
cry from day to do today. Wah, wah, wah from all the
way home… Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, …
(5-year-old boy); (2)… the dinosaurus Rex came and
took that toy away. And then the elephant said, ‘No way
ballface!’ And then the door came and slammed… (4-yearold boy). These story-telling strategies, which were
used by 18% of the children to express happiness or
sadness, were not evident in the invented songs of
6- to 12-year-olds (Adachi & Trehub, 1999a), which
suggests that boundaries between songs and stories
are not as clear-cut for younger children as for older
children.
Melodies
The majority of children (75%, n = 30) generated original melodies, with only 25% using
familiar melodies, either keeping the entire song
(e.g., Barney) intact (10%, n = 4), or borrowing tonal
motives (e.g., ABC, Mary had a Little Lamb) for use
with original lyrics (15%, n = 6). For children who
generated original melodies, most (55%, n = 22)
combined original melodic and rhythmic elements,
in contrast to a minority of children (20%, n = 8)
whose creative emphasis was on rhythm.
Happy melodies exhibited greater influence
of the major mode while sad melodies exhibited
greater influence of the minor mode, including
reduced pitch range and compressed contour, χ2(2,
N = 40) = 16.67, p < .0001 (Figure 3). Happy melodies tended to include more dotted rhythms than
isochronous rhythms, with the reverse for sad melodies, χ2(2, N = 40) = 3.89, p = .14 (Figure 4). This
tendency was confirmed statistically when rhythmically unclear songs were removed from the analysis,
χ2(1, N = 38) = 3.89, p = .049. The intended emotion
was unrelated to beat regularity: 27.5% of songs (n
= 11) were primarily regular, 37.5% (n = 15) were
partially regular, and 35% (n = 14) were irregular.
In previous research with older Canadian children (Adachi & Trehub, 1999a, 1999b), happy
songs showed more influence of the major mode
than did sad ones, but sad songs exhibited no such
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Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
Figure 1. A sad song invented by a 5-year-old girl. The score, transcribed by the first author, was
checked with a few musicians.
Figure 2. A happy song invented by a 4-year-old girl. The score, transcribed by the first author, was
checked with a few musicians.
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Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’ happy and sad songs
Figure 3. Number of happy and sad songs identified as
major, minor, and unclear. Melodies with reduced range or
compressed contour (flat sound) were classified as minor.
Figure 4. Number of happy and sad songs with dotted,
isochronous, and unclear rhythms.
differentiation. In fact, only good 11- and 12-yearold singers clearly differentiated modality across
happy and sad songs. Canadian preschoolers in
the present study reduced the size of intervals or
compressed the melodic contour for their sad
songs, but there was little evidence that the minor
mode was used consistently to convey sadness
(see Figure 1). Twelve (30%) of the preschoolers’
songs were characterized by unclear mode. In four
instances, the songs (two happy, two sad) sounded
more like spoken narrations than like singing,
resulting in unclear rhythm. A number of other
instances sounded like chant (Moorhead & Pond,
1941) or rap, lacking a sense of melody but possessing a clear sense of rhythm.
and sad lyrics. In addition, the use of rhythmic and
melodic features differentiated their happy from
their sad intentions. The purpose of the present
experiment was to examine whether young Japanese
preschoolers would respond in a similar manner.
experiment 2
The results of Experiment 1 revealed that many
preschoolers could use their singing to communicate happiness and sadness. As was the case for older
Canadian children (Adachi & Trehub, 1999a), the
intended emotion of Canadian preschoolers’ songs
was reflected in their lyrics. However, the predominant association of sad feelings with thwarted goals
(e.g., “having no sweets”) and isolation from family
or friends was in marked contrast to the predominant death theme of older children’s sad songs
(Adachi & Trehub, 1999a).
Canadian preschoolers incorporated emotionally appropriate words and events in their happy
Method
Participants
The participants in the present experiment
were part of large cross-cultural investigations of
children’s singing (e.g., Adachi, 2000). The present sample included 34 middle-class Japanese
preschoolers 4 to 6 years of age. Only 15 of these 34
children, or 44.1%, produced materials for auditory
analysis—7 boys (M = 4.43 years old, SD = .54) and 8
girls (M = 4.63 years old, SD = .74).
Apparatus and Procedure
Recordings were done in a quiet, unfamiliar
room at the children’s preschool by means of a Sony
DCR-PC1 digital video camera, a Sony TCD-D8
digital audio recorder, and a Sony ECM-MS957
microphone. The room was decorated with color
drawings similar to those used in Experiment 1.
Half of 34 children in the sample were asked to
make up a happy song and half were asked to make
up a sad song. All of the instructions, pictorial props,
encouragement, and prompts were similar to those
used in Experiment 1.
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Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
Content analysis of lyrics
The lyrics of each song were transcribed by a
native Japanese speaker and confirmed by means
of independent transcriptions of another native
Japanese speaker. The coding categories for the
lyrics from Experiment 1 were used in the present
experiment. Inter-rater reliability for each coding
category was evaluated by calculating Cohen’s
kappa (Siegel & Castellan, Jr., 1988) between the
first author and the independent rater who coded
each category for three happy songs and two sad
songs (i.e., 33% of all the lyrics) selected randomly.
High reliabilities were confirmed for all coding categories (κs = .90–1.0), and the first author’s coding
was used for statistical analyses.
Content analysis of melodies
Digital recordings of children’s songs were
converted to acoustical files by means of Protools
Software (Digidesign). Two musicians who were
familiar with young children’s singing listened
to three happy and two sad tunes (i.e., 33% of all
tunes) and determined that the categories from
Experiment 1 could be coded reliably (κs = .65-1.0).
The first author’s coding was used for statistical
analyses.
Results and Discussion
Overall, only 44.1% (15 of 34) of Japanese preschoolers produced any kind of song in response to the
request for a made-up song that expressed happiness or sadness, with compliance being considerably
higher for happy songs (11 of 17, or 64.5%) than
for sad songs (4 of 17, or 23.5%). The proportion of
sad songs produced by Japanese children (23.5%)
differed significantly from the proportion produced
by Canadian children (20 of 31, 64.5%), χ2(1, N = 48)
= 7.38, p = .007, but the proportion of happy songs
for Japanese (64.5%) and Canadian children (20 of
35, or 57.1%) did not differ, χ2(1, N = 52) = 0.60, p =
.272.
Of those Japanese children who produced happy
or sad songs, only 20% (n = 3) created original
lyrics (original/others), which consisted of story-like
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phrases (e.g., portraying a sparrow or bunny) or
simple word repetition (e.g., “Micky”). The remaining children (80%, n = 12) used the lyrics of familiar
songs, with a small modification in one case. Japanese
children’s tendency to use the lyrics of familiar songs
rather than creating new lyrics approached conventional levels of significance, χ2(1, N = 15) = 3.07, p =
.08. The distribution of original lyrics differed across
emotion categories, with 2 of the 4 sad songs and
only 1 of the 11 happy songs having original lyrics.
This outcome contrasts markedly with the 90%
incidence of original lyrics produced by Canadian
children for their happy and sad songs.
Unlike Canadian preschoolers’ songs, neither
positive emotion words (e.g., daisuki [love], omoshiroso [seemingly having fun], kirei [pretty], oishii
[delicious]) nor positive emotion-evoking events
(e.g., yume o kanaetekureru [a dream comes true],
okashi o mitsuketa [found candy]) were reliably associated with happy intentions. However, none of the
happy songs had negative emotion words, χ2(1, N =
11) = 11.00, p = .0009, or negative events, χ2(1, N =
11) = 11.00, p = .0009. By contrast, negative emotion
words (e.g., kanashii [sad], naiteita [crying]) or events
(e.g., “Suzume-chan ga tobenakunatte imashita [A sparrow could not fly]”) were observed in the sad songs.
The differential use of negative lyrics was statistically significant for words, χ2(1, N = 15) = 6.35, p =
.012, and approached conventional levels of significance for events, χ2(1, N = 15) = 2.95, p = .086. Thus,
Japanese preschoolers’ use of expressive verbal cues
was apparent for sad songs, but not for happy songs,
unlike Canadian preschoolers in Experiment 1, who
used positive verbal cues for happy songs and negative verbal cues for sad songs.
Despite the use of similar visual prompts in the
Canadian and Japanese contexts, the words “candy”
and “playing” appeared consistently in Canadian
preschoolers’ happy songs but in only 2 of the 11
Japanese preschoolers’ happy songs, where they
were simply adopted from existing songs. Canadian
preschoolers’ typical negative themes, such as
the blocking of desired actions or the absence of
family or friends, had no counterpart in Japanese
preschoolers’ sad songs, which may be due to the
small number of original lyrics produced by the
Japanese sample.
Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’ happy and sad songs
Three children in the present experiment
selected “Suzume no Kyodai [Sparrow Brothers],” as
their happy song despite its lyrical theme of blocked
hope, which pervaded the sad songs of Canadian
preschoolers. In the song, the sparrow brothers
converse: “What shall we become when we grow up?’
‘I will become a hawk!’ ‘I will become a penguin!’
Chirp, chirp, chirp, ... But, even when they grow up
[after all], sparrows are sparrows. Chirp, chirp.” This
song, which was popular across age groups in Japan
at the time of data collection (1999), had musical
features associated with happiness such as the major
mode and occasional staccato articulation. The song
can be viewed as having conflicting cues to emotion
because of blocked verbal desire (implying sadness)
and happy melodic features. It is unclear whether
the lyrics were noticeable and comprehensible to
young listeners. Although there are suggestions that
young children focus on verbal rather than melodic
features when evaluating a speaker’s or singer’s
feelings (Morton & Trehub, 2001, 2007), that may
not always be the case. For example, few children
or adults express concern about the plight of the
three blind mice in the well-known children’s song
(e.g., “She cut off their tails with a carving knife.
Did you ever see such a sight in your life?”) It is difficult to know whether singers of the sparrow song in
the present experiment chose it because of melodic
features typically associated with positive affect,
pleasant memories associated with the song, or the
song’s popularity and consequent accessibility.
As they did with the lyrics, 80% (n = 12) of
Japanese preschoolers used melodies from familiar
songs. Only 20% (n = 3) generated original melodies, in contrast to 75% of the Canadian children.
Comparing across emotion categories, 2 out of
the 4 sad melodies produced by Japanese children
were original, in contrast to only 1 of the 11 happy
melodies. None of the Japanese children modified the melodic features of familiar songs, unlike
their Canadian counterparts. Japanese children’s
tendency to use familiar melodies rather than
generating entirely new melodies or engaging in
improvisation with familiar melodies approached
significance, χ2(1, N = 15) = 3.07, p = .08.
The Japanese children’s happy melodies exhibited influences of the major mode (n = 8) or unclear
modality (n = 3), χ2(2, N = 11) = 8.91, p = .012, but no
modal tendency was evident for their sad melodies.
Unlike Canadian preschoolers’ songs in Experiment
1, Japanese preschoolers showed no differential use
of rhythm across happy and sad melodies. Rather,
the rhythms of Japanese preschoolers’ happy melodies sounded more isochronous than dotted or
unclear, χ2(2, N = 11) = 12.18, p = .002, quite the opposite of that observed with Canadian preschoolers.
gener al discussion
The present study revealed Canadian and Japanese
children’s ability to express feelings of happiness and
sadness in their singing. However, their approach
to the challenge of inventing an emotionally
expressive song was starkly different. In response to
requests to create a happy or sad song, over 60% of
Canadian preschoolers produced some kind of song
in contrast to roughly 44% of Japanese children.
Although Canadian and Japanese children were
similar in the proportion of happy songs produced,
Japanese children produced a substantially smaller
proportion of sad songs. Most Canadian preschoolers expressed their emotional intentions by means
of invented songs featuring novel lyrics, melodies,
or both, but Japanese preschoolers did so largely by
means of familiar melodies and lyrics.
What accounts for Japanese children’s reluctance to produce sad songs and their limited
creativity in the context of expressive singing?
Although Japanese preschoolers are encouraged
to be sensitive to the feelings and needs of others,
there is less encouragement for expressing their
feelings, especially negative ones, than is the case
for American children (Hayashi et al., 2009; Yogo
& Onoue, 1998; Zahn-Waxler, Friedman, Cole,
Mizuta, & Hiruma, 1996). Japanese schoolchildren,
for example, show less emotional expressiveness in
their drawings of human figures than do American
schoolchildren (La Voy et al., 2001). Japanese preference for restraint in the expression of strong
emotions, even for positive emotions, remains
evident in adulthood (Safdar et al., 2009).
Moreover, although Japanese children are more
compliant than American children in the early
77
Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
years of elementary school, tolerance for noncompliance at the preschool level seems to be greater
in Japan than in North American (Abe & Izard,
1999). Finally, Japanese children’s inclination to
sing familiar songs coupled with the prevalence of
happy songs in the children’s repertoire may have
made noncompliance seem like a suitable option.
In short, a variety of factors could have contributed,
separately or in combination, to the difference in
complying with the request to create happy or sad
songs.
The frequent use of invented songs by Canadian
preschoolers and their infrequent use by Japanese
preschoolers raise the possibility of differences in
musical creativity favoring young Canadian children. When Japanese first graders in a previous
study were asked to make up a happy or sad song,
70% of them sang familiar songs (Adachi, 2001).
Japanese preschoolers’ and first graders’ reliance
on songs in their repertoire may be influenced by
preschool curricula, which feature daily singing of
familiar songs in the same key with piano accompaniment (Trehub, Schellenberg, & Nakata, 2008)
and weekly learning of new songs but no creative
music-making (Adachi, 2001, in press). These experiences may carry the implicit message that music
is something to be learned rather than created,
interfering, perhaps, with the imaginative or divergent thinking that underlies creative music-making
(Adachi & Chino, 2004). By contrast, musical utterances shared among playmates in North America
(Campbell, 1998) and Australia (Whiteman, 2001)
as well as rhymes and chants observed in playgrounds throughout the world (Opie & Opie, 1973)
have their roots in free play and freely expressed
exuberance. Such unbounded activity may enhance
creative music-making both on and off the
playground.
Even though Japanese preschoolers also engage
in exuberant playground singing, almost all of the
songs produced are either standard songs with
Western tonal influence or traditional songs with
Japanese tonal influences (warabe-uta) that were
invented by previous generations of Japanese children, with some improvisation of word rhythms
(Fujita, 1997, 2000, 2001, 2002; Fujita & Nakakura,
1996; Ogawa & Imagawa, 2008). This is in sharp
78
contrast to the spontaneous songs observed in an
Australian daycare center, the majority of which
are invented (Whiteman, 2001). When creative
music-making is introduced to the elementaryschool curriculum in Japan (Adachi & Chino,
2004), it unleashes the creative musical potential
of Japanese children. By the fourth grade, 75%
of those Japanese children provide original songs
when asked to do so (Adachi, 2000, 2001).
Nevertheless, there are suggestions that the
creative potential of Asian individuals is inhibited
by prevailing cultural values of submissive individuality and conformance to group ideals (Ng, 2001).
The idealization of conformance is evident in the
well-known Japanese proverb, “the nail that sticks
up gets hammered down.” Children are exposed
to these cultural values in a variety of ways, including the lyrics of popular songs such as “Sparrow
Brothers.” Being correct or doing the right thing
in the eyes of adults may also be implicated (Ng,
2001). In that respect, choosing a familiar song
would be less risky than creating one that might be
considered inappropriate or substandard.
Cultural pressures for conformity can be countered, to some extent, by settings that nurture
individuality or free expression. For example,
Japanese first-graders who attend daycare programs
that emphasize individual expression invent happy
or sad songs twice as frequently as their peers in
standard daycare settings (Adachi, 2004). In any
case, the net result of Canadian preschoolers’
predominant use of invented songs and Japanese
preschoolers’ predominant use of familiar songs
was that Canadian children’s productions provided
greater insight into their developing expressive
abilities.
On the surface, the happy songs of Canadian
preschoolers showed conventional musical influences such as the major mode and dotted or
syncopated rhythms. While it is tempting to attribute
implicit understanding of modality to preschoolers because of influences of the major mode on
happy songs and minor mode in the sad songs, it
is premature to do so. For one thing, the categories of major and minor were defined very broadly
for use with a sample of preschoolers. Moreover,
the sad melodies were characterized primarily by
Canadian and Japanese preschoolers’ happy and sad songs
reduced interval size or compressed contour rather
than specific features of the minor mode. Adults
also use compressed contour to convey sadness in
their speech (Scherer, 1981), and Canadian children do so in their sad renditions of familiar songs
(Adachi & Trehub, 1998). Finally, children do not
associate major and minor modes with happy and
sad emotions until about 6 years of age (Dalla Bella,
Peretz, Rousseau, & Gosselin, 2001). With respect
to timing, children’s differential use of dotted or
syncopated rhythms for happy contexts may reflect
associations between specific actions (e.g., skipping, jumping, dancing) and positive mood.
The style of Canadian preschoolers’ invented
songs ranged from storytelling-like to highly musical. For example, the happy song of one 4-year-old
(Figure 2) featured the major mode along with
dotted or syncopated rhythms and affectively positive lyrics. The sad song of one 5-year-old (Figure
1) manipulated modality from major to minor as
the final theme of death was introduced. For the
most part, however, sad songs featured compressed
contours and affectively negative lyrics. In general,
the melodies of happy and sad songs were integrated with the lyrics and exhibited some expressive
devices characteristic of Western art music.
The lyrics of Canadian preschoolers’ invented
songs featured typical everyday experiences, much
like those that appear in their stories (Saarni, 1999).
In contrast to death as the primary sad theme for 6to 12-year-old Canadian singers (Adachi & Trehub,
1999a), the primary sad theme of Canadian
preschool singers was absent friends or family.
Interestingly, happy themes were more consistent
in preschoolers’ lyrics than in those of older children (Adachi & Trehub, 1999a), which may reflect
older children’s increasing experience and verbal
fluency.
Japanese preschoolers’ overwhelming production of familiar songs (80%) rather than original
songs made it difficult to assess their developing
expressiveness. The features observed in their lyrics
and melodies largely reflected the practices of
composers and popular performers rather than the
children’s own expressive abilities. Perhaps it is not
surprising, then, that child-like emotional themes
were largely absent from the lyrics.
Performances in a storytelling (i.e., speech-like)
manner were uncommon both for Canadian and
Japanese preschoolers, in contrast to the higher
incidence reported by Umemoto (1999). Perhaps
the necessity of generating melodies for prescribed
texts in Umemoto’s study increased the prominence
of the lyrics, promoting spoken narration.
In sum, the present study revealed that preschoolers are capable of expressing happy and sad
intentions by means of singing, either by inventing
songs, as Canadian children did, or by performing
familiar songs, as Japanese children did. It remains
to be determined whether the emotional intentions
of such invented songs are interpretable to child
and adult audiences. It would also be of interest to
determine whether preschool children who fail to
generate novel songs exhibit comparable inhibition
in other creative realms such as drawing, fantasy
play, and dancing.
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81
Mayumi Adachi & Sandra E. Trehub
au t h o r n o t e s
Funding for data collection was provided by
a grant from Social Sciences and Humanities
Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada to the
second author. The authors also acknowledge the
assistance and encouragement of AIRS, which is
also funded by SSHRC. Portions of Experiment
1 were reported in a Japanese-language journal with limited circulation (Adachi & Trehub,
2003). We thank Jane Campbell (Experiment 1)
and Miho Tanaka (Experiment 2) for assistance
with data collection. We also thank Loretta Falco
and Lori Jiang (Experiment 1) as well as Japanese
students (Experiment 2) for transcription of the
lyrics and coding for reliability. Finally, we thank
Gary Vasseur for his helpful comments on the
manuscript.
biogr aphies
Mayumi Adachi worked
as a piano teacher after
receiving her B.A. in
music education from
Niigata University. She
studied piano pedagogy
at Teachers College at
Columbia
University,
where she completed
her M.A. and Ed.M. in
Mayumi Adachi
music and music education while studying
psychology. She received her Ph.D. in psychomusicology from the University of Washington, and
worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the University
of Toronto at Mississauga. Her interdisciplinary
background gave her flexibility in her career, teaching music education (Yamanashi University) and
psychology (current), and conducting quantitative
and qualitative research on a variety of phenomena surrounding the development and learning of
music. She chaired ICMPC10 in 2008, archived at
http://www.jsmpc.info/archives/icmpc10archive/
index.html.
82
Sandra Trehub, who
obtained her doctorate
from
McGill
University in 1973, is
Professor
Emeritus
of Psychology at the
University of Toronto
and Visiting Professor
at the International
Laboratory for Brain,
Sandra E. Trehub
Music
and
Sound
Research (BRAMS) at
the Université de Montréal. She has published extensively on infants’ perception of music and parents’
songs to infants. Although most of her research is
conducted in her laboratory, she sometimes travels
to remote regions of the world to observe mothers’
musical interactions with infants.
