Attention
Groove Task
Also called: groove ratings, sensation of groove, experience of groove, urge to move to music, syncopation and groove, wanting to move ratings
Measure how much rhythms make people want to move: listeners hear short drum and bass patterns through headphones at low, medium and high syncopation and rate how much each makes them want to move and how much they enjoy it.
5-7 minUntimed
Free to start: 10 free participants per account, then $0.99 per participant for academic research, or any yearly plan. Try it here first, with no account.
- Papers, 2021 to 2025
- 90
- Evidence grade
- D
- Registered clinical studies
- 0
What it measures
Measures how much rhythms make people want to move. Participants hear short drum and bass patterns through headphones, at low, medium and high syncopation, and rate how much each makes them want to move and how much they enjoy it. The main score is how much higher medium syncopation is rated for wanting to move than low and high. There is no correct rating.
Constructs
- Groove
- Sensorimotor coupling with music
- Musical pleasure
Research uses
- Music cognition research
- Rhythm and movement research
- Music and reward research
How the paradigm works
Groove is the pleasurable urge to move to music (Janata, Tomic and Haberman, 2012). Syncopation shapes it: in Witek and colleagues (2014), listeners rated drum patterns with a medium amount of syncopation highest both for wanting to move and for pleasure, so both ratings form an inverted U over syncopation. Matthews and colleagues (2019) found the same with simple rhythms over a hi-hat.
More about the paradigm
Set a comfortable volume and take the 6-trial headphone check. A failed check stops the task by default; researchers can continue with a quality flag.
Twelve one-bar patterns of five notes, three in the first half of the bar and two in the second, over a hi-hat on every eighth note. Four are at each level of syncopation by the index of Fitch and Rosenfeld (2007): low (0), medium (4 to 6) and high (16 to 18). A kick drum and a bass note (D2) play the rhythm together.
96 beats per minute, the bar four times: 10 seconds, synthesized by our code. Equal RMS, 12 dB below the volume-setting tone.
Press Play and hear the whole pattern, then rate how much it makes you want to move and how much you enjoy it, each from 1 (not at all) to 5 (very much), and press Next, with no time limit. There is no correct rating.
Each pattern plays once in a seeded order: 12 pairs of ratings. Repetitions are a setting from 1 to 3, giving 12 to 36 pairs, each repetition in its own order.
1 practice pattern of medium syncopation, used nowhere else. The task gives no advice on how to rate.
The primary score is the inverted U of wanting to move: the mean rating at medium syncopation minus the mean of the low and high means, in scale points, above 0 when medium syncopation is rated highest. The same contrast for enjoyment, the mean of each rating at each level, both overall means and the correlation between the two ratings accompany it. Answers under 100 ms from the rating buttons opening leave scores.
Scores
- Inverted U, wanting to movescore
- Mean wanting-to-move rating at medium syncopation minus the mean of the low and high means; every level must have usable ratings.
- Descriptive; above 0 when medium syncopation is rated highest
- Inverted U, enjoymentscore
- Mean enjoyment rating at medium syncopation minus the mean of the low and high means; every level must have usable ratings.
- Descriptive; above 0 when medium syncopation is rated highest
- Wanting to move, low syncopationscore
- Mean usable wanting-to-move rating, 1 to 5, for the low syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Wanting to move, medium syncopationscore
- Mean usable wanting-to-move rating, 1 to 5, for the medium syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Wanting to move, high syncopationscore
- Mean usable wanting-to-move rating, 1 to 5, for the high syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Enjoyment, low syncopationscore
- Mean usable enjoyment rating, 1 to 5, for the low syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Enjoyment, medium syncopationscore
- Mean usable enjoyment rating, 1 to 5, for the medium syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Enjoyment, high syncopationscore
- Mean usable enjoyment rating, 1 to 5, for the high syncopation patterns.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Mean wanting to movescore
- Average usable wanting-to-move rating on the 1 to 5 scale.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Mean enjoymentscore
- Average usable enjoyment rating on the 1 to 5 scale.
- Descriptive; no better direction
- Moving and enjoyment correlationscore
- Pearson correlation between the two ratings over the usable patterns; empty with fewer than 3 or no variation.
- Informational
- Median answer timems
- Median time from the rating buttons opening to Next.
- Informational
- Anticipationscount
- Answers under 100 ms, excluded from scores.
- Informational
- Completed trialstrials
- Patterns with both ratings in the selected run.
- Informational
- Planned trialstrials
- Number planned in the selected run.
- Informational
- Headphone check passedscore
- 1 for a passed equipment check, 0 for a failed check.
- Informational
- Headphone check correctcount
- Correct equipment-check responses out of six.
- Informational
- Reported output delayms
- Output delay reported by the browser, empty when unavailable.
- Informational
Use and evidence
90 papers from 2021 to 2025 name this task in their title or abstract, up 157% compared with 2016 to 2020. That ranks it 289 of 670 test families in our census. See the counts for every test.
Show the numbers
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 41 |
| 2024 | 16 |
| 2023 | 13 |
| 2022 | 13 |
| 2021 | 7 |
| 2020 | 5 |
| 2019 | 10 |
| 2018 | 6 |
| 2017 | 8 |
| 2016 | 6 |
| 2015 | 2 |
| 2014 | 6 |
| 2013 | 2 |
| 2012 | 6 |
| 2011 | 3 |
| 2010 | 1 |
| 2009 | 4 |
| 2008 | 0 |
| 2007 | 0 |
| 2006 | 0 |
| 2005 | 1 |
| 2004 | 1 |
| 2003 | 0 |
| 2002 | 0 |
| 2001 | 1 |
| 2000 | 0 |
Use grade D
30 to 99 papers from 2021 to 2025.
Evidence grade D
Little published measurement evidence found.
- Papers on test-retest reliability
- 1
- Papers on reliability or validity
- 6
- Registered clinical studies using it as an outcome
- 0
Measured on ConductCognition
Pooled across the studies that feed our platform norms, by device group. A figure needs 50 or more people.
No pooled figure yet.
How the grades work
Use: A is 1,000 or more papers from 2021 to 2025, B 300 to 999, C 100 to 299, D 30 to 99 and E fewer than 30. Evidence: A means at least 25 papers report its test-retest reliability and at least 25 registered clinical studies use it as an outcome; B, at least 8 test-retest papers, and either 5 registered clinical studies or 150 reliability or validity papers; C, at least 2 test-retest papers, 30 reliability or validity papers or 3 registered clinical studies; D, little published measurement evidence found. The counts measure use. They include every paper that names the task in its title or abstract. Grades describe the published research on this task, not ConductCognition's version of it.
Source: ConductCognition test census 0.48.0, counted 12 November 2026 from OpenAlex and ClinicalTrials.gov.
Task design
The trial sequence as the test runs in ConductCognition.
- Sound setup
- Set a comfortable volume and take the 6-trial headphone check. A failed check stops the task by default; researchers can continue with a quality flag.
- Patterns
- 12 one-bar patterns of five notes over a hi-hat on every eighth note, 4 at each level of syncopation by the index of Fitch and Rosenfeld: low (0), medium (4 to 6) and high (16 to 18). Each has three notes in the first half of the bar and two in the second.
- Sound
- A kick drum and a bass note together on the rhythm and a synthesized hi-hat, at 96 beats per minute, the bar four times: 10 seconds. Equal RMS, 12 dB below the volume-setting tone.
- Trial
- Press Play and hear the whole pattern. Then rate how much it makes you want to move and how much you enjoy it, each from 1 (not at all) to 5 (very much), and press Next, with no time limit.
- Trials
- Each of the 12 patterns once in a seeded order: 12 pairs of ratings. Repetitions are a setting from 1 to 3, giving 12 to 36 pairs, each repetition in its own order.
- Practice
- 1 practice pattern of medium syncopation, used nowhere else. The task gives no advice on how to rate.
- Scores
- The primary score is the inverted U of wanting to move: the mean rating at medium syncopation minus the mean of the low and high means, in scale points. The same for enjoyment, the mean of each rating at each level, both overall means and the correlation between the two ratings accompany it. Answers under 100 ms from the rating buttons opening leave scores.
Our synthesized patterns follow the published design, and medium syncopation was rated highest for both questions in Witek and colleagues (2014). The inverted U describes ratings within this task, with no percentile. Headphones, normal hearing and a comfortable volume are required; levels are relative rather than calibrated. Results do not assess hearing or musical ability.
Quality checks
Each session is marked valid, needs review or invalid, with the reason, before you see its scores.
Scored rows: groove_test from the selected run, two ratings from 1 to 5 after each pattern ends. Ratings have no correct answer. The same pair of ratings throughout and an incomplete run are flagged for review; answers under 100 ms leave scores and invalidate when at least half. A failed headphone check is flagged when continued, and a stopped check leaves no results.
Why these rules
There is no correct option to compare with chance, so accuracy is not judged against chance. A listener can want to move to any pattern or rate every pattern alike, so the same ratings throughout flag review only. The rating buttons open after the pattern ends, and Next needs both ratings.
No percentile. Scores and quality flags only.
Running this test
Settings you can change
| Setting | Standard | Allowed |
|---|---|---|
| When the headphone check fails | Stop the test | Stop the test, Continue the test |
| Repetitions | 1 | 1 to 3 |
Yearly plans can change settings within these limits. Free and pay-as-you-go studies use the standard settings.
Need a setting this test does not have?
Devices and languages
- Untimed test: runs on desktops, laptops, tablets and phones. Needs headphones. Participant devices
- Languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Chinese (Simplified) and Japanese.
- Available on: Every plan, including the free plan.
- No percentile. Scores and quality flags only. How norms work
- Recruiting online? See the setup guides for Prolific, Sona Systems, CloudResearch Connect and Qualtrics.
Cite and describe
Participants completed the Groove Task in a web browser (ConductCognition task version 1.0.0, scoring version 1.0.0; Janata and colleagues, 2012; Witek and colleagues, 2014), with the standard settings (when the headphone check fails: Stop the test; repetitions: 1). The main score was inverted U, wanting to move (mean wanting-to-move rating at medium syncopation minus the mean of the low and high means; every level must have usable ratings).
ConductCognition versions: task version 1.0.0, scoring version 1.0.0. Every export records the versions each session used, for a methods section.
- Janata, P., Tomic, S. T., & Haberman, J. M. (2012). Sensorimotor coupling in music and the psychology of the groove. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 141(1), 54-75. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0024208Groove as a pleasurable drive toward action, and music that listeners rate reliably for it.
- Witek, M. A. G., Clarke, E. F., Wallentin, M., Kringelbach, M. L., & Vuust, P. (2014). Syncopation, body-movement and pleasure in groove music. PLoS ONE, 9(4), e94446. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0094446The two questions on five-point scales, and the inverted U of both ratings over syncopation.
- Matthews, T. E., Witek, M. A. G., Heggli, O. A., Penhune, V. B., & Vuust, P. (2019). The sensation of groove is affected by the interaction of rhythmic and harmonic complexity. PLOS ONE, 14(1), e0204539. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0204539Five-note bars over an eighth-note hi-hat at 96 beats per minute, the three levels of syncopation and the quadratic contrast.
- Stupacher, J., Wrede, M., & Vuust, P. (2022). A brief and efficient stimulus set to create the inverted U-shaped relationship between rhythmic complexity and the sensation of groove. PLOS ONE, 17(5), e0266902. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0266902The inverted U from a few patterns rated once, and the worked syncopation index.
- Fitch, W. T., & Rosenfeld, A. J. (2007). Perception and production of syncopated rhythms. Music Perception, 25(1), 43-58. https://doi.org/10.1525/mp.2007.25.1.43The syncopation index that sets the three levels.
- Woods, K. J. P., Siegel, M. H., Traer, J., & McDermott, J. H. (2017). Headphone screening to facilitate web-based auditory experiments. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 79(7), 2064-2072. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-017-1361-2The shared headphone check.
Source papers
- Witek, M. A. G., Clarke, E. F., Wallentin, M., Kringelbach, M. L., & Vuust, P. (2014). Syncopation, body-movement and pleasure in groove music. PLoS ONE, 9(4), e94446.Paradigm source, Adults
Questions
How long does the Groove Task take?
About 5 to 7 minutes, as listed in the test library.
What device does a participant need?
Untimed test: runs on desktops, laptops, tablets and phones. Needs headphones. The browser must be Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari.
What scores does it produce?
Inverted U, wanting to move, Inverted U, enjoyment, Wanting to move, low syncopation, Wanting to move, medium syncopation, Wanting to move, high syncopation, Enjoyment, low syncopation, Enjoyment, medium syncopation, Enjoyment, high syncopation, Mean wanting to move, Mean enjoyment, Moving and enjoyment correlation, Median answer time, Anticipations, Completed trials, Planned trials, Headphone check passed, Headphone check correct and Reported output delay. Each session is also marked valid, needs review or invalid, with the reason.
How widely is the Groove Task used in research?
90 papers from 2021 to 2025 name it in their title or abstract, up 157% compared with 2016 to 2020. That ranks it 289 of 670 test families in the ConductCognition test census (use grade D). Source: ConductCognition test census 0.48.0, counted 12 November 2026 from OpenAlex and ClinicalTrials.gov.
How much reliability evidence does the Groove Task have?
In the published research, 1 paper reports its test-retest reliability and 0 registered clinical studies use it as an outcome (evidence grade D in the ConductCognition test census).
Does it report a percentile?
No. Scores and quality flags only.
Which settings can a researcher change?
When the headphone check fails (Stop the test, Continue the test) and repetitions (1 to 3). Settings can be changed on yearly plans; free and pay-as-you-go studies use the standard settings.
Which languages can participants use?
Participants can take this test in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Chinese (Simplified) and Japanese. English is on every plan, and the other languages come with yearly plans. Have a native speaker read the machine-translated text before launch.
Is this a clinical test?
No. ConductCognition is for research use only. It runs, scores and exports the test; clinical interpretation is outside the platform.
Every test: the full test list.
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