Feedback, Role of

Feedback and Automaticity

Psychologists have distinguished between feedback that is under closed- and open-loop control. When new skills are being acquired, performance of the individual components of the activity require individual checking. This is known as closed-loop control. The closed loop refers to feedback between the execution of an individual action being used to check the match between intention and action. If there is a match, then the next individual action can be executed. Behavior under closed-loop control is halting, slow, and variable. As skills become well learned through practice, the need for this level of feedback is eliminated. The skilled performer instigates an action and does not check that each individual action matches the initial intention. This is known as open-loop control and reflects the development of automaticity in skills. The performer still responds to naturally occurring feedback but at a meta, conscious level to take account of the current situation.

Multisensory Feedback Experienced by Performers

Knowledge of results is necessary for all learning. Without feedback there is no means of improving. When instrumentalists or singers practice or perform, they receive multisensory feedback in [Page 462]relation to the music that they are producing. The most important feedback is aural, relating to the sounds they are making, but they will also experience kinesthetic feedback (related to movement, e.g., muscle use, finger patterns), visual feedback (from their place in written notation and in some cases from what they can see of their instrument), and emotional feedback that may be related to emotions conceptualized in the music or their response to the quality of their performance. There is evidence that the naturally occurring aural feedback as perceived by musicians differs from that perceived by listeners. This means that performers need to draw on feedback from others or use recordings of their performances to take the perspective of a listener.

During practice, the learner needs to use the naturally occurring feedback to enable improvement. This will only be useful if the individual already has an internal representation of what he/she is trying to achieve. To be able to evaluate progress, current performance must be compared to the mental representation of what is being aimed for. Representations of new music to be learned can be acquired by studying the score, playing the music, or using a recording. Novice musicians experience difficulties in making use of naturally occurring feedback effectively and often make errors, in part because they do not have mental representations of what they are trying to learn.

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