Abstract

This research is aimed to determine the effects of piano education on the attention skills of 7-12-year-old children. In the research, pretest-posttest control group design is used, and attention skills of both of the groups are measured before and after the experiment. Unlike the control group (n=53), the experimental group (n=46) had private piano education an hour a week for 14 weeks with a tutor, and as a result of the cooperation with the parents, the students practised the piano on their own at home. For collecting data, 4 stage Stroop Colour-Word Test is used. In analysing the data, SPSS 23.0 packaged software and 2x2 mixed ANOVA’s are used. Independent factors are determined as group (piano lesson group and control group) and time (pretest-posttest). Dependent variables are reading black and white (RBW), name the colour of the square patches (NCS), reading the coloured words (RCW) and saying the colours of the coloured words (SCCW). Different ANOVA’s are used for each dependent variable. In the study, in all the applied sections, it was seen that the reading time of the children who have been having piano education has shortened and their attention skills have been improved. Nevertheless, especially in ‘Name the Colour of Square Patches’ and ‘Reading the Coloured Word’ tests results it was seen that, children having piano education have improved their attention skills statistically more than the children who are not having piano education. Children having piano education are considered to be more careful about the aliasing effect and their perception to be improved.

Key words: Piano education, attention skills, Stroop colour-word test.