Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

I’m interested in doing the “Pitch Perception” project for my STEM fair project. This particular project calls for (group 1: pianists, group 2: violinists and group 3: non-musicians).
My thinking on this:
• Group three they call “non-musicians.” Trouble is, a lot of my friends have a couple of years of piano but do not currently play. Would it be best to call Group 3: “Neither?” That way, any experience with an instrument other than piano or violin would fall into this group.
• Would it be better to add a fourth category and have the categories as follows: Group 1: Piano; Group 2: Violin; Group 3: Other; Group 4: Non-musicians. (group 4 would include experience with any instrument--guitar, tuba, voice lessons, etc.) Or would that be too complicated?
• Also, I’m thinking of having the questions on the questionnaire as follows:
Name:
Age:
Gender:
Contact info:

Do you have experience playing:

Violin How many years? ____

Piano How may years? ____

Neither Piano or Violin

My hope is to get 50 to 100 people per group. Am I missing anything?
Thank you so much for your help with this.

Hi cordeliacias,

I think in general your set-up is pretty solid! I think that having 4 categories would be helpful, but I wouldn't differentiate between skill levels. For instance, if you had one friend who took piano lessons several years ago but no longer practices and one friend who takes piano lessons currently and practices daily, include them in the same group. That way you don't have to decide what the threshold for "pianist" is. Same for violin. Then group 3 could be "OTHER" as in any other instrument, and then non-musicians could be saved for people you survey that have no experience in any instrument in group 4.

Otherwise, I don't think anything is missing from this set-up. Feel free to reply to this post again if you have any further questions!

Good luck,
AAE Robbie