I main on fingerstyle guitar, but I find my aural understanding on guitar feels impeded. Now I know music theory and how the fretboard works, but translating it is so damn laborious.
I've played other instruments, and this is what I've noticed about their impact:
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Penny whistle. It's mostly in one key. The root will always be the same fingering and the fifth will always be the same fingering. I think this helps with making associations with sound and scale degree, as opposed to more chromatic instruments played in different keys. [Also used a transposing electronic digital instrument to the same effect.]
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Clarinet: Having to figure out the fingerings made me painfully aware of key signatures and where the sharps and flats are. On guitar you can smoothly shift up or down a fret without much thought or just play in position, but on clarinet there is often a specific button or button combo you need to get one specific note.
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This is the big one: Piano. You do need to bring a little theory into it to know what chords you're playing, but the actual NOTES you are playing are immediately obvious, and since I'm building all these chords myself, I know exactly where the third is and how to lower it to make a major a minor, or where to add a major seventh, so I can also very quickly ask myself, "What if went with a minor chord here instead" and almost instantly be able to play it. On guitar, there's a tendency to just memorize chords as shapes without knowing where the chord tones are because each shape has them in a different configuration (which is why eyes-closed arpeggio exercises are absolutely vital for guitarists).
[On piano it's also easier to play the same inversions over and over again, which might help you learn the sound. You can play a whole song with Root-3rd-Fifth if you want, but on guitar, the common chord shapes are a kaleidoscope of chord tones. For instance, common chord tones on root chords:
C: O-R-3-5-R-3
F: R-5-R-3-5-R
G: R-3-5-R-3-R
]
I'm curious about violin, too, because I'm betting needing to intonation just right really sharpens your ear.
What's your experience?