Why Adolescents Participate in a Music Contest and Why They Practice – The Influence of Incentives, Flow, and Volition on Practice Time

Abstract

Music contests are a means of discovering talents and promoting musical abilities. Participation in a contest is usually preceded by many years of practice requiring a high level of motivation and a supportive environment, especially regarding family. Despite the importance participation in music contests may have for musical development, there is a considerable research deficit. The annual music contest "Jugend musiziert" (youth making music) is the most important musical competition for highly gifted young musicians in Germany. There has been comprehensive research on the participants of "Jugend musiziert" by Hans Günther Bastian in the 1980s and 1990s, but since then, only very little research has been published. In 2017, we started a large-scale study on the participants at the national level, covering a broad range of topics, including sociocultural background, development and learning, performance practice, personality traits, motivation, and musical performance anxiety. A standardized paper-pencil questionnaire was administered to approximately 2,260 participants and a total of 1,143 valid questionnaires was returned (age 9-24 years; M = 15; SD = 2.1, female = 62%). Using principal component, variance, correlation, and linear discriminant analyses, interdependencies between practice time and motivational factors were analyzed in this paper. Concerning practice time, major differences between participants of different contest categories became clear, with classical musicians practicing the most. Practice time, as well as parental support and supervision, correlated with age: Older participants spent, on average, more hours practicing and received less support and supervision. Challenge was the most important incentive for all participants, but more decisive for participants in the classical solo contest than in the ensemble category. Female participants were more prone to fear incentives than males. Participants who practiced a lot scored higher on general flow than the participants with a smaller amount of practice and also showed significantly more perseverance. Moreover, participants of the

High-Performing Young Musicians’ Playing-Related Pain. Results of a Large-Scale Study

“…A high degree of extroversion could also be an expression of the need to present oneself on stage in order to experience and perform power (cf. Bullerjahn et al, 2020). The performance on stage depends on conscientious preparation, which requires a high degree of practice.…”

“…For the examination of the competition participants, we developed a standardized paper-pencil questionnaire (17 pages, including some open questions), which covers a broad range of aspects, e.g., the instrument played, personal experiences with the "Jugend musiziert" contest, sociocultural variables, personality, musical training and practice, motivation, musical preferences, and support from the family, as well as questions concerning PRP and other health aspects (for more detailed information see Bullerjahn, 2018, 2019;Bullerjahn et al, 2020). Personality factors were recorded using the BFI-10 inventory (Rammstedt et al, 2012).…”

“…The different case numbers for the various instruments are due to the fact that the 2017 "Jugend musiziert" contest was not meant for all instruments, but for specific instruments in both the solo and ensemble categories. A very different number of young musicians participated in each of the contest categories (for details see Gembris and Bullerjahn, 2019;Bullerjahn et al, 2020).…”

“…The present study is a part of a comprehensive large-scale study of adolescent, highly talented musicians participating in the 2017 national contest "Jugend musiziert" (youth making music) in Germany (Gembris and Bullerjahn, 2018;Bullerjahn et al, 2020). This annual contest has existed for more than 50 years and is the largest and most important contest for young musicians in Germany.…”

“…The general objective of this large-scale study on the participants of the national contest "Jugend musiziert" is to collect basic information on the personality and sociocultural environment of the competition participants, their motivations, amount of practice, musical attitudes, etc. (see Bullerjahn et al, 2020). The subject of the present paper is playing-related pain (PRP) among high-performing young musicians, a topic that has rarely been investigated and which we aim to explore using the example of participants in the "Jugend musiziert" national contest.…”