Moving to the rhythm of a music we like arises almost without realizing it, and even children are great dancers in their style. But, Is dance an innate ability or do we learn it?
According to research by Marcel Zentner and his colleagues at the University of York, we are born with a predisposition to move rhythmically in response to music. The study was carried out by observing a group of babies and young children, whose ages were between five months and two years of age.
In two experiments with 120 babies and children, the little ones were exposed to various musical extracts and rhythmic stimuli. The babies produced diverse movements to the rhythm of the music, which were judged by various methods, picking them up in video and 3D capture technology.
According to Zentner, it is the rhythm rather than the melody that produces an answer, an answer that seems very pleasant for children, since it was accompanied by a smile, even “the more they synchronize their movements with the music, the more the children smile” . Without a doubt, potential dancers, although with diverse musical tastes, of course.
The conclusions of the study were published in the March issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Online, and can be consulted in full.
Zentner says that it is not yet clear why we humans have developed this predisposition to move to the rhythm of music, but it is increasingly clear that babies are born programmed for dancing. Another thing is how they end up dancing as adults ...
