The Influence of Peer Imitation on Expressive Movement to Music

While seated in a circle, kindergarten children were asked to show the way four one-minute music excerpts sounded by moving their hands, arms, and head under two conditions. First, the children were asked to move to the music excerpts while wearing blindfolds so that each child could not see the other children. Second, the treatment was repeated by asking the children to move to the music excerpts with the blindfolds removed. A similar expressive movement score for each child was computed by comparing his or her type of movement during ten-second intervals to the movements of other children in the group. The experiment was replicated with preschool children. In both studies mean scores for the amount of similar expressive movement were significantly greater (p < .05) when the children moved without blindfolds. Results indicated that peer imitation significantly influences expressive movement in both preschool and kindergarten children.