Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna, August 22-26 2006 ISBN 88-7395-155-4 © 2006 ICMPC 1658 Young children’s musical experiences with a flow machine Anna Rita Addessi University of Bologna Italy addessi@muspe.unibo.it Laura Ferrari Kindergarten “Villa Teresa”, Bologna, Italy Simona Carlotti Primary School, Rimini Italy François Pachet SONY - Computer Science Laboratory, Paris, France ABSTRACT In the field of the studies on creativity is placed the Theory of Flow introduced by Csikszentmiahlyi (1990) in order to describe the state of Flow, or “optimal experience”, experimented by the creative persons during their preferred activities At the Sony Computer Science Laboratory, an innovative system was elabo- rated able to produce music in the same style as the person play- ing the keyboard, the Continuator. The ability of the system to attract and hold the attention of children could be interpreted through the theory of Flow (Pachet 2006). The DiaMuse project is carrying out dealing with the interaction between young chil- dren and the Continuator. During the interaction with the system, the children seem to reach high levels of “well-being” and crea- tivity, very similar to those described by Csikszentmiahlyi. We also noticed the presence of the flow indicators as observed by Custodero (2005) in musical experiences. An observation grid was realized in order to analyse in details the emotive tones de- scribed in the Theory of Flow. Keywords: Continuator, Flow, Music education. INTRODUCTION A recent study is been carried out to observe the interaction between children and a particular interactive reflective mu- sic system: the Continuator, elaborated at the SONY- Computer Science Laboratory of Paris (Pachet 2003). The results had shown as children, during the interaction with the system, reach high levels of “well-being”, of pleasure and creativity, very similar to those described by Csik- szentmihalyi (1990) in the Flow Theory. It was possible to observe a sort of life cycle of interaction, and some micro- processes similar to one observed in child/adult interaction (Stern 1995, Imberty 2005) (see Pachet & Addessi 2004, Addessi & Pachet 2005b). Csikszentmiahlyi (1990) describes the Flow state, or opti- mal experience tested by creative people while they are doing their favourite activities. When the activities are felt pleasant it can be possible notice a good balance between high levels of challenges and high levels of skills. During these activities people is completely absorbed, and forgets, for that moment, everything is not inherent in the task. The self awareness is less present, the time seems to pass very quickly, and every task is perceived worth tackling for it- self. In the analysis conducted by Csikszentmihalyi the state of Flow is been compared with other emotive states defined on the relation between challenge and skills (Fig.1): Worry and Anxiety in which the level of chal- lenges is higher than the skills one; Relaxation e Boredom in which the level of challenges is lower than the skills’ one; in the Apathy the levels both of the skills and of chal- lenges are too low. The other two emotive states, the Arousal and the Control, can lead to the Flow state and so they are positively considered. In: M. Baroni, A. R. Addessi, R. Caterina, M. Costa (2006) Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Music Perception & Cognition (ICMPC9), Bologna/Italy, August 22-26 2006.©2006 The Society for Music Perception & Cognition (SMPC) and European Society for the Cognitive Sciences of Music (ESCOM). Copyright of the content of an individual paper is held by the primary (first-named) author of that pa- per. All rights reserved. No paper from this proceedings may be repro- duced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or me- chanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the paper's primary author. No other part of this proceedings may be reproduced or transmit- ted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information retrieval system, without permission in writing from SMPC and ESCOM.