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# Listener Perception and Musical Structure: A Study of Segmentation in Sonata Form

## Details

**Authors** L. T. Fink, K. Frieler, R. Muralikrishnan, M. Wald-Fuhrmann

**Year** 2026

**Publisher** Music & Science

**Kind of work** article

**Discipline** Music Theory

**Secondary disciplines** Psychology

**Applied** false

[Read it at the publisher](https://doi.org/10.1177/20592043261437593) 
10.1177/20592043261437593

## In authors' words

### Abstract

This study aims to create a dialogue between music psychology and music-theoretical discourse on the perception of musical form. In a lab and online study, we investigated how listeners segment Western classical music in real time, focusing on (1) inter-rater agreement, (2) alignment with music-theoretical analyses of sonata form, (3) subjective qualities of segment boundaries (beginnings, endings, importance ratings), and (4) the effects of repeated listening.

### What they set out to do (purpose)

To examine whether listeners' spontaneous, real-time segmentation of classical music aligns with formal music-theoretical analysis of sonata form.

### Who or what was studied (sample)

Lab study: 43 participants without formal musical training; online study: 88 participants; all completed musical sophistication questionnaires.

### How they did it (methods)

Participants marked perceived segment boundaries in real time via key press while listening twice to two Romantic orchestral movements (one with clear structural boundaries, one with ambiguous transitions), rating boundaries on expectedness, sense of ending, and importance; results were compared to formal analyses following Caplin's and Hepokoski/Darcy's sonata theory using Gaussification, dynamic time warping, and signal detection theory.

### What they found (results)

Listener-marked segment boundaries showed above-chance agreement with each other and strong correspondence with music-theoretical sonata-form boundaries at major, acoustically salient structural moments, but this alignment weakened for secondary themes and formally important yet acoustically unmarked transitions, with repeated listening reshaping agreement differently depending on how clearly a piece's form was articulated.

## Commentary

### In short

The study describes a system of nested musical parts (themes, sections, sonata-form units) whose boundaries listeners partially but not fully distinguish, comparing two perspectives on the same piece—naive listening and formal music-theoretical analysis—that only partly align.

**Patterns it shows** D, S, P

**Added** 2026-09-19

**How to cite this** L. T. Fink, K. Frieler, R. Muralikrishnan, M. Wald-Fuhrmann (2026). Listener Perception and Musical Structure: A Study of Segmentation in Sonata Form. Music & Science.