From auditory rhythm patterns, listeners extract the underlying steady beat and perceptually group beats to form metres. While previous studies show infants discriminate different auditory metres, it remains unknown whether they can maintain (imagine) a metrical interpretation of an ambiguous rhythm through top‐down processes. We investigated this via electroencephalographic mismatch responses. We primed 6‐month‐old infants (N = 24) to hear a 6‐beat ambiguous rhythm either in duple metre (n = 13) or in triple metre (n = 11) through loudness accents either on every second or every third beat. Periods of priming were inserted before sequences of the ambiguous unaccented rhythm. To elicit mismatch responses, occasional pitch deviants occurred on either beat 4 (strong beat in triple metre; weak in duple) or beat 5 (strong in duple; weak in triple) of the unaccented trials. At frontal left sites, we found a significant interaction between beat and priming group in the predicted direction. Post‐hoc analyses showed that mismatch response amplitudes were significantly larger for beat 5 in the duple‐primed than triple‐primed group (p = .047) and were non‐significantly larger for beat 4 in the triple‐primed than duple‐primed group. Further, amplitudes were generally larger in infants with musically experienced parents. At frontal right sites, mismatch responses were generally larger for those in the duple compared with triple group, which may reflect a processing advantage for duple metre. These results indicate that infants can impose a top‐down, internally generated metre on ambiguous auditory rhythms, an ability that would aid early language and music learning.

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Does low frequency sound (bass) make people dance more? Music that makes people want to move tends to have more low frequency sound, and bass instruments typically provide the musical pulse that people dance to1. Low pitches confer advantages in perception and movement timing, and elicit stronger neural responses for timing compared to high pitches2, suggesting superior sensorimotor communication. Low frequency sound is processed via vibrotactile3 and vestibular4 (in addition to auditory) pathways, and stimulation of these non-auditory modalities in the context of music can increase ratings of groove (the pleasurable urge to move to music)3, and modulate musical rhythm perception4. Anecdotal accounts describe intense physical and psychological effects of low frequencies, especially in electronic dance music5, possibly reflecting effects on physiological arousal. However, we do not know if these associations extend to direct causal effects of low frequencies in complex, real-world, social contexts like dancing at concerts, or if low frequencies that are not consciously detectable can affect behaviour. We tested whether non-auditory low-frequency stimulation would increase audience dancing by turning very-low frequency (VLF) speakers on and off during a live electronic music concert and measuring audience members’ movements using motion-capture. Movement increased when VLFs were present, and because the VLFs were below or near auditory thresholds (and a subsequent experiment suggested they were undetectable), we believe this represents an unconscious effect on behaviour, possibly via vestibular and/or tactile processing.

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