University at Buffalo (UB)
Rhythmic Communication Entrainment Research
Do you wanna dance? If you are interested in why we move to the beat and what moving to someone else's beat makes us do, this study is for you!
Project description
Are people more likely to take actions based on appeals that engage their rhythmic modalities? Since at least the Ancient Greeks, scholars have explored the effects of rhythm on communication effectiveness. This project will develop a comprehensive literature review and design a series of laboratory experiments for a seminal study on the entraining effects of rhythmic communication.
Project outcome
Students in this research opportunity will help research and write a literature review on the entraining effects of rhythmic movement in human communication contexts. They will also help design a series of laboratory experiment designs and design a conference poster to be displayed at one of several potential venues, including the poster competition at the UB campus, Singapore Institute of Management. The projected end of the student portion of the project is Spring 2023.
Project details
| Length of commitment | longer than a semester (6-9 mos) |
| Start time | Summer (May/June of 2022) |
| In-person, remote, or hybrid? | Hybrid Project |
| Level of collaboration | Larger group (8-12) but may work in smaller groups |
| Benefits | Research experience |
| Who is eligible | All undergraduate students , COM 225, COM 101 or PSY 101 recommended |
Project mentor
Core partners
- Dr. Timothy Pruitt
Project mentor
Kenton Bruce Anderson
Professor of Instruction
Communication Science
Phone: (716) 645-2368
Email: kba2@buffalo.edu
Start the project
- Email the project mentor using the contact information above to express your interest and get approval to work on the project. (Here are helpful tips on how to contact a project mentor.)
- After you receive approval from the mentor to start this project, click the button to start the digital badge. (Learn more about ELN's digital badge options.)
Preparation activities
Once you begin the digital badge series, you will have access to all the necessary activities and instructions. Your mentor has indicated they would like you to also complete the specific preparation activities below. Please reference this when you get to Step 2 of the Preparation Phase.
The specific preparation activities for this project will be customized through discussions between you and your project mentor. Please be sure to ask them for the instructions to complete the required preparation activities.
Students will work toward the creation of literature review on communication entrainment. Sources will be cross-disciplinary and may come from any of the sciences currently exploring the broad topics of entrainment, hypnosis, music, rhythm, biology, physics, audiology, psychology, etc. An initial challenge will be organizing the topic areas within entrainment, in order to parse out the various uses of the term itself within the scientific literature at large.
The later focus of the research will be designing a series of laboratory experiments using the Galileo suite of computer programs, as well as other methodologies commonly used in communication, psychology, and music research.
Specific additional videos and literature prompts will be shared with student researchers as the project goes along
Keywords
Communication UB-Singapore Institute Mgmt location