The Inquiry Into Prenatal Musical Experience: A Report of the Eastman Project 1980-1987

This paper describes early research and current trends in prenatal brain
growth, development of the auditory system, and characteristics of the fetal environment including auditory
stimuli. Questions which initiated the investigator’s longitudinal study of pre and postnatal response to musical
stimuli are discussed. The protocol for the research, nature of specific musical stimulus sources, pre and
postnatal behavioral response, and implications for accelerated musical and speech development are
discussed. A review of data collection procedures, and observations regarding infant cognitive, affective, and
psychomotor development of the subjects involved in the study will be presented. Plans for continued
observation of both control and experimental subjects are described. My interest in both the handicapped and
the musically gifted young child dates from the early ’60s, and forms the basis for this status report of a study of
prenatal and postnatal response to musical stimuli initiated as a result of my association with the Japanese
musician and educator, Shinichi Suzuki. You may recall that Suzuki’s work has always included the
handicapped as well as the average and talented children. It was Suzuki who speculated about the possibility
that the unborn child was able to respond to recorded violin repertoire.