Academic andResearch Experience

While 12-tone equal temperament has been broadly standardised by Western culture, it requires deviation from pure-tone intervals, resulting in dissonance. Although foundational research by Plomp, Levelt, and Sethares has provided insights into the physiological effects of sensory roughness, there is a lack of quantitative analysis surrounding other aspects of dissonance — in combination with sensory roughness — such as contextual difference. This study investigates the ‘dissonant cost’ of tuning systems, comparing 12-tone equal temperament and 19-tone equal temperament with just intonation and Pythagorean tuning across the keys of C, F♯, and G major. This was explored through perceptual models, including the Sethares, Milne, and Parncutt models. Results revealed that no singular tuning system is universally less dissonant; rather, pure-tone tuning systems prioritise consonance for specific keys while equal-temperament systems broadly prevent severely out-of-tune intervals. These results offer a framework to design optimised adaptive tuning systems.