Rate My Professor Jonathan Prince

Jonathan Prince, known professionally as Jon Prince, is an Associate Professor of Psychology in the School of Psychology at Murdoch University in Perth, Australia. His academic career includes progression from lecturer to his current position, with prior postdoctoral research at the University of Toronto Scarborough, Department of Psychology. Prince earned his PhD and specializes in cognitive psychology, with a focus on music cognition and perception. His research examines how listeners integrate pitch and time structures in melodies, tonal-metric hierarchies, metrical grouping, and the perceptual salience of musical elements. More recently, he explores music-based interventions for healthy ageing and dementia, investigating cognitive and neuroscientific perspectives on music's therapeutic potential, including emotional responses to harmonic cadences and the benefits of singing or listening to music for behavioural improvements in dementia patients. He supervises doctoral students on topics such as domain-general syntax resources in music processing, the impacts of distraction versus acceptance on distress, and interactions between music, noise, and mental imagery vividness.

Prince's scholarly impact is evidenced by over 710 citations on Google Scholar. Key publications include 'Pitch and Time, Tonality and Meter' (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 2009; cited by 126), 'The Integration of Stimulus Dimensions in the Perception of Music' (Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 2011; cited by 53), 'Learning of Pitch and Time Structures in an Artificial Grammar Setting' (2018; cited by 16), 'Perceived Emotions of Harmonic Cadences' (Music & Science, 2020), and 'Cognitive and Neuroscientific Perspectives of Healthy Ageing: Implications for Music-Based Interventions' (Ageing Research Reviews, 2024; cited by 60). He received internal funding from Murdoch University for the project 'Combining Patterns in Pitch and Time' (2012–2014). Professionally, Prince serves on the editorial board of Music Perception, as Treasurer of the Australian Music & Psychology Society, Secretary of the Murdoch University NTEU Branch, and as an elected academic staff representative on the University Senate. His research has been highlighted in outlets like the documentary 'Does Sound Heal?', discussing sound frequencies for neurological conditions.