Your pupil doesn't miss a beat
Our pupils reveal that even when not paying attention, we are musical. This has been revealed by research conducted by Atser Damsma and Hedderik van Rijn, researchers at the department of Psychology. They discovered that our pupils react to changes in the beat, even when we are not consciously listening to the music. Damsma and Van Rijn asked test subjects to perform a task and simultaneously listen to drum beats. When a major beat was skipped, the pupils became larger.
More information
- Atser Damsma
- Damsma en Van Rijn publication
- Je pupillen zijn muzikaler dan je denkt [Your pupils are more musical than you think]

University of Groningen videos
The weekly online video magazine Unifocus highlights topics related to the University of Groningen in the fields of research and society, student life, teaching, policy and internationalization.
You can find more videos in our video portal.
Last modified: | 28 September 2021 2.33 p.m. |
More news
-
29 April 2025
Elitism as threatening as populism
In the case of racism or sexism, people are judged by their skin colour or gender and considered different and inferior based on that. But there is also a phenomenon called educationism: highly educated people looking down on those who are less...
-
15 April 2025
Impact gaswinningsproblemen op Groningers: negatieve ontwikkeling zet niet door, maar meerdere keren schade blijft een punt van zorg
Impact gaswinningsproblemen op Groningers: negatieve ontwikkeling zet niet door, maar meerdere keren schade blijft een punt van zorg
-
17 March 2025
Liekuut | The high price of conflicts
According to Carsten de Dreu, Professor of Foundations of Cooperation and Social Organization at the University of Groningen, a lot can be learned from conflicts.