Expecting the end: Continuous expectancy ratings for tonal cadences (score = 5)

Cognitive accounts for the formation of expectations during music listening have largely centered around mental representations of scales using both melodic and harmonic stimuli. This study extends these findings to the most recurrent cadence patterns associated with tonal music using a real-time, continuous-rating paradigm. Musicians and nonmusicians heard cadential excerpts selected from Mozart’s keyboard sonatas (PAC, IAC, HC, DC, EV), and continuously rated the strength of their expectations that the end of each excerpt is imminent. As predicted, expectations for closure increased over the course of each excerpt and then peaked at or near the target melodic tone and chord. Cadence categories for which tonic harmony was the expected goal (PAC, IAC, DC, EV) received the highest and earliest expectancy ratings, whereas cadence categories ending with dominant harmony (HC) received the lowest and latest ratings, suggesting that dominant harmony elicits weaker expectations in anticipati