Investigating the directional link between music-induced visual imagery and two different types of emotional responses Thijs Vroegh1 1 Max
Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt, Germany
[email protected]
AIMS
INTRODUCTION • Visual imagery (VI) in music listening has been proposed1 and found2 as one of multiple self-reported ‘causes’ of emotions.
We do not know whether VI precedes emotions, vice versa, or whether there is instead a mutual effect. RQ1: Which model best represents the interrelationship between visual imagery and emotions?
• In contrast, recent evidence suggests its reverse, i.e., that VI instead develops out of emotional experience.3
The quality of felt emotion appears as one influential factor.
• Emotions like longing often occur with episodic memory rather than with VI, whereas the opposite pattern was found true of pleasure responses.4
RQ2: Do positive, hedonic emotions (PE) such as feeling good lead to other ‘causal links’ with visual imagery than negative-tinted and more complex, mixed emotions (ME) such as nostalgia or sadness?
RESULTS
METHODS
Figure 1 | Structural model (tested separately for PE and ME)
Design and Sample • Online listening study (N = 602) • 20 pieces of music • Differing in valence and arousal • Classical, rock, popular, dance, and film music
e.g., “I experienced a great deal of visual imagery” (VI)
VISUAL IMAGERY
Measures and Procedure • Participants chose and listened to one piece. • Immediately after filled in state measures regarding their quantity and vividness of imagery, positive and mixed emotions, attentional focus and the Tellegen Absorption Scale (TAS) as instrumental variables,5 and altered awareness.
TAS
ALTERED AWARENESS
FOCUSSED ATTENTION
Analysis • (Non-) recursive structural equation modelling6 • Compare fit of competing, nested models to evaluate whether and how the association between VI and emotions is best explained.
e.g., “This music made me feel happy” (PE)
p
χ2/df
GFI
CFI
SRMR
>0.05
