Modernizing Links Between Text and Music: Connecting the Sentiment Properties of Text with Those of Spectral Music

My current research is an attempt to investigate and standardize the links between the sentiment of text and music by creating a software program which can connect these sentiment properties with those of spectral music. This is an attempt to modernize the way in which a composer writes music based on any given text by cross-referencing each word with quantitative ranking of words in terms of sentiment properties. The result will be a multimedia experience whereby the observer can listen to the sounds that are intrinsically linked the words viewed in real-time

Analyzing Sentiment in Twitter Tweets as a Basis for Music Creation

Analysis of the sentiment associated with different words has long been used as a pre-compositional tool by various composers through their use of the words of poets, lyricists or writers in creating their music. While the interpretation of any given word and its relation to music might have loosely followed some implicitly accepted notions amongst composers, there was no accurate method for qualifying each word according to its sentiment in standard usage. More recent research measuring individuals’ evaluation of text has led to a quantitative ranking of words in terms of properties concerning sentiment. My current research is an attempt to investigate and standardize the links between the sentiment of text and music by creating software that allows creation of spectral music from a Twitter user’s output. Using Cycling ’74’s Max 7, software will be developed to analyze text from each “tweet” by cross-referencing its words against the The Evaluative Lexicon 2.0 developed by Rocklage, Rucker and Nordgren. This database ranks words on three qualities; valence, emotionality and extremity. The summative sentiment derived each tweet can then be applied to different features relating to the creation and shaping of spectral music, for example, linking the valence outcome of each tweet to harmonicity vs inharmonicity, a significant aspect of spectral music pitch selection. This technique of mapping data to sound will allow the music to reflect the emotionality of a user’s tweet, giving the listener a sense that what they are reading is appropriately linked to what they are hearing

Two Movements for Orchestra

Two Movements for Orchestra, is a piece of music aimed at developing the use of the process of phasing. Used extensively as a device in minimalist music, this piece explores the process when applied to a wide variety of instruments using free chromaticism. When the process is applied to instruments of contrasting timbres, the results can include: increased resonance, echo-like effects and increased rhythmic complexities. As the piece unfolds, the avoidance of any strict pulse or beat found within the first movement is replaced by a desire for rhythmic clarity within the second movement. This dichotomy is essential to showing the importance of phasing as a compositional tool

Shared Features Dominate Semantic Richness Effects for Concrete Concepts

When asked to list semantic features for concrete concepts, participants list many features for some concepts and few for others. Concepts with many semantic features are processed faster in lexical and semantic decision tasks [Pexman, P. M., Lupker, S. J., & Hino, Y. (2002). The impact of feedback semantics in visual word recognition: Number-of-features effects in lexical decision and naming tasks. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,9, 542–549; Pexman, P. M., Holyk, G. G., & MonFils, M.-H. (2003). Number-of-features effects and semantic processing. Memory & Cognition,31,842–855]. Using both lexical and concreteness decision tasks, we provided further insight into these number-of-features (NoF) effects. We began by replicating the effect using a larger and better controlled set of items. We then investigated the relationship between NoF and feature distinctiveness and found that features shared by numerous concrete concepts such as facilitate decisions to a greater extent than do distinctive features such as . Finally, we showed that NoF effects are carried by shared visual form and surface, encyclopedic, tactile, and taste knowledge. We propose a decision-making account of these results, rather than one based on the computation of word meaning

Application of image analysis and image simulation for quantitative characterization of scale spallation during cyclic oxidation of a Pt-aluminide coating

An image analysis and simulation of the spalled alumina areas at the surface of a Pt modified b-NiAl aluminide coating RT22 during cyclic oxidation in air is presented. The size distribution of the freshly spalled areas and of the unspalled zones is studied for the same coating deposited on three different nickel base superalloys which were exposed to various numbers of 300 h cycles at 1050 8C (up to 10,500 h) in a previous study [Vialas N, Monceau D. Oxid Metals, submitted for publication]. It is shown for this coating that the distribution of the freshly spalled area depends on the nature of the coated substrate and on the number of cycles. It is also shown that spallation of these three systems can be simulated by a twoparameter model which describes the spalling during the cooling step as successive microspalling events through nucleation and growth processes. This approach is consistent with previous in-situ observations and allows the introduction of a time-dependent damaging process in the models of cyclic oxidation kinetics

The masked cognate translation priming effect for different-script bilinguals is modulated by the phonological similarity of cognate words: Further support for the phonological account

The effect of phonological similarity on L1-L2 cognate translation priming was examined with Japanese-English bilinguals. According to the phonological account, the cognate priming effect for different-script bilinguals consists of additive effects of phonological and conceptual facilitation. If true, then the size of the cognate priming effect would be directly influenced by the phonological similarity of cognate translation equivalents. The present experiment tested and confirmed this prediction: the cognate priming effect was significantly larger for cognate prime-target pairs with high-phonological similarity than pairs with low-phonological similarity. Implications for the nature of lexical processing in same-versus different-script bilinguals are discussed

Orthographic properties of distractors do influence phonological Stroop effects: Evidence from Japanese Romaji distractors

In attempting to understand mental processes, it is important to use a task that appropriately reflects the underlying processes being investigated. Recently, Verdonschot and Kinoshita (Memory & Cognition, 46,410-425, 2018) proposed that a variant of the Stroop task-the "phonological Stroop task"-might be a suitable tool for investigating speech production. The major advantage of this task is that the task is apparently not affected by the orthographic properties of the stimuli, unlike other, commonly used, tasks (e.g., associative-cuing and word-reading tasks). The viability of this proposal was examined in the present experiments by manipulating the script types of Japanese distractors. For Romaji distractors (e.g., "kushi"), color-naming responses were faster when the initial phoneme was shared between the color name and the distractor than when the initial phonemes were different, thereby showing a phoneme-based phonological Stroop effect (Experiment1). In contrast, no such effect was observed when the same distractors were presented in Katakana (e.g., "< ") pound, replicating Verdonschot and Kinoshita's original results (Experiment2). A phoneme-based effect was again found when the Katakana distractors used in Verdonschot and Kinoshita's original study were transcribed and presented in Romaji (Experiment3). Because the observation of a phonemic effectdirectly depended on the orthographic properties of the distractor stimuli, we conclude that the phonological Stroop task is also susceptible to orthographic influences