Who Should Play the Instrument?: Effects of Pitch and Loudness on Children's Gender Associations With Musical Instruments

Previous research has demonstrated early‐emerging gender associations with musical instruments. We investigated whether pitch, loudness and size affect gender‐instrument associations in older ( M age = 9.37 years, N = 57) and younger ( M age = 7.73 years, N = 63) children (approximately even gender split, mostly North American), as well as American undergraduates ( M age = 19.57 years, N = 50). Participants selected whether a girl or boy character should play fictional instruments with different pitch (high/low), volume (loud/soft) and size (large/small). Children were more likely to select boy characters for low‐ than high‐pitched instruments (60% vs. 44%), as were adult undergraduates (79% vs. 54%). Older boys were also more likely to select boy characters for loud than soft instruments (68% vs. 52%). Size had no effect for any group. Results suggest pitch and loudness impact gender‐instrument associations, and that gender associations are not restricted to gender‐instrument pairings children have former experience with.