Musical Motivation: Investigating Musical Contingent Self-Worth and Its Interactions with Music Training and Perceived Musical Ability

A large-scale correlational study aimed at testing the predictive capabilities of a musical contingent self-worth (MCSW) scale (a measure of how motivated one is to have and display musical ability). Specifically, this work will examine how MCSW might moderate the positive relationships that have already been found between music training, perceived musical ability, and performance on auditory tasks. This study will also seek to confirm whether MCSW relates only to auditory/musical performance by having participants complete comparable auditory and visual tasks. Altogether, this work has the potential to shed light on the power of "musical motivation" in predicting performance on tasks that are perceived as being musical in nature, holding implications for those conducting research within the realms of music cognition, music education, and achievement motivation.