Paul Fraisse and the psychology of rhyme

The concept of rhythm is no referred to a natural experience, but a product of human movement organization. Given that in order to study rhythm it is necessary to decompose human activity in alternating periods, most psychologists devoted to the study of rhythm have also collaborated in the study of time perception. This is the case of Paul Fraisse (1911-1996), who developed his studies at L'Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, the Sorbona University and Paris V University. Paul Fraisse was a pioneer in the transition from the Psychology of Consciousness to an objectivist experimental Psychology, in which his experimental designs for the study of rhythm perception can be highlighted. Thus, Fraisse followed the work of Albert Michotte, specifically through the analysis of motor performance of perceived rhythmic forms. His research overcome methodological impairments of Introspective methods, and afforded the functional relations of stimuli and behavior and the explanatory level, through innovative experimental designs that are revisited in this work. Fraisse's theory rhythmic activity considers three levels of analysis: perception and action, repetition and synchrony, and accent and duration. This work revisited his main experimental designs, as well as their integration in a comprehensive theory of rhythm perception which, despite the author's statements, it is mainly a motor one.