A New Context Affording for Regulation: The Case of Musical Play

The present study set out to investigate theoretical speculations that regulation and musical play, an initial manifestation of musicality, are directly linked. This study aimed to explore the potential for regulation to occur during musical play and investigate the nature of the regulatory behaviours. Thirty-six children, aged 6 and 8, were observed during musical play sessions. These observations were analysed, using a coding framework, to identify and code regulatory behaviours as to the type of regulation, its social nature and the direction of activity. The data were subjected to quantitative analysis. The findings suggest that regulatory behaviours occurred during musical play. During musical play tasks, cognitive monitoring and emotional/motivational monitoring behaviours were the most prevalent, significantly more opportunities were provided for socially-shared regulation compared to self- or co-regulation, and the children more often directed their activity towards fundamental, rather than superficial aspects of tasks. The results can inform theory and practice.