Individual ratings of vividness predict aesthetic appeal in poetry.

Belfi, Amy M.; Vessel, Edward A.; Starr, G. Gabrielle

doi:10.1037/aca0000153

Cited by 47 publications

(86 citation statements)

References 70 publications

(92 reference statements)

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“…Alternatively, the DMN's engagement during aesthetic experience may reflect its theorized role in the construction of mental scenes (48). Such mental imagery, involving an interplay of topdown information with bottom-up stimulus properties, is a key aspect of many aesthetic experiences (40,64). This balance of activation between higher-tier visual regions and DMN regions likely depends on the degree to which an observer is able to recognize familiar content (65).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…and aesthetic judgments can be made in the absence of approach motivation, a signature of reward (39). In addition, aesthetic experiences need not be based on either primary rewards or simple associations with primary rewards, such as when imagery (40) or information foraging, sense making, and uncertainty reduction (41)(42)(43) lead to pleasing aesthetic experiences.…”

Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

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The default-mode network represents aesthetic appeal that generalizes across visual domains

Vessel

Isik

Belfi

et al. 2019

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Visual aesthetic evaluations, which impact decision-making and well-being, recruit the ventral visual pathway, subcortical reward circuitry, and parts of the medial prefrontal cortex overlapping with the default-mode network (DMN). However, it is unknown whether these networks represent aesthetic appeal in a domain-general fashion, independent of domain-specific representations of stimulus content (artworks versus architecture or natural landscapes). Using a classification approach, we tested whether the DMN or ventral occipitotemporal cortex (VOT) contains a domain-general representation of aesthetic appeal. Classifiers were trained on multivoxel functional MRI response patterns collected while observers made aesthetic judgments about images from one aesthetic domain. Classifier performance (high vs. low aesthetic appeal) was then tested on response patterns from held-out trials from the same domain to derive a measure of domain-specific coding, or from a different domain to derive a measure of domain-general coding. Activity patterns in category-selective VOT contained a degree of domain-specific information about aesthetic appeal, but did not generalize across domains. Activity patterns from the DMN, however, were predictive of aesthetic appeal across domains. Importantly, the ability to predict aesthetic appeal varied systematically; predictions were better for observers who gave more extreme ratings to images subsequently labeled as “high” or “low.” These findings support a model of aesthetic appreciation whereby domain-specific representations of the content of visual experiences in VOT feed in to a “core” domain-general representation of visual aesthetic appeal in the DMN. Whole-brain “searchlight” analyses identified additional prefrontal regions containing information relevant for appreciation of cultural artifacts (artwork and architecture) but not landscapes.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

The default-mode network represents aesthetic appeal that generalizes across visual domains

Vessel

Isik

Belfi

et al. 2019

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Furthermore, research on aesthetic preferences in poetry suggests that a predominance of content is also found outside of the visual domain. According to Belfi, Vessel, and Starr (2018), the best predictors for aesthetic liking of a sonnet or a haiku were the "vividness of imagery experienced in reading, valence, and arousal of perceived emotion in a poem's content" (p. 341).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Kitsch and Perception: Towards a New ‘Aesthetic from Below’

Ortlieb

Carbon

2019

Art Percept.

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Although kitsch is one of the most important concepts of twentieth-century art theory, it has gone widely unnoticed by empirical aesthetics. In this article we make a case that the study of kitsch is of considerable heuristic value for both empirical aesthetics and art perception. As a descriptive term, kitsch appears like a perfect example of hedonic fluency. In fact, the frequently invoked opposition of kitsch and art reflects two types of aesthetic experience that can be reliably distinguished in terms of processing dynamics: a disfluent one that promises new insights but requires cognitive elaboration (art), and a fluent one that consists of an immediate, unreflective emotional response but leaves us with what we already know (kitsch). Yet as a derogatory word, kitsch draws our attention to a general disregard for effortless emotional gratification in modern Western aesthetics that can be traced back to eighteenth-century Rationalism. Despite all efforts of Pop Art to embrace kitsch and to question normative values in art, current models of aesthetic liking—including fluency-based ones—still adhere to an elitist notion of Modern art that privileges style over content and thereby excludes what is essential not only for popular taste and Postmodern art but also for premodern artistic production: emotionally rich content. Revisiting Fechner’s (Vorschule der Aesthetik, 1876) criticism of highbrow aesthetics we propose a new aesthetic from below (Aesthetik von Unten) that goes beyond processing characteristics by taking content- and context-related associations into account.

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“…It is these attributes of mental imagery that enable works of literature to move readers to experience narrative and characters as if they are 'real'. Yet, it is vividness itself rather than arousal that is most closely correlated with the aesthetic appreciation of poetry such as haiku or sonnets [13].…”

Section: The Nature and Function Of Imagerymentioning

confidence: 99%

I am Conscious, Therefore I am: Imagery, Affect, Action, and a General Theory of Behaviour

Marks¹

2019

Preprint

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Organisms are adapted to each other and the environment, not as tradition would have it, because natural selection made them that way, but because there is inbuilt striving towards stability and equilibrium. A General Theory of Behaviour connects imagery, affect and action with the central executive system we call Consciousness. The General Theory is founded on the assumption that the primary motivation of all of Consciousness and intentional behaviour is Psychological Homeostasis. Psychological homeostasis is as important to the organisation of mind and behaviour as Physiological Homeostasis is to the organisation of bodily systems. Consciousness processes quasi-perceptual images independently of the input to the retina and sensorium. Consciousness is the “I-Am” control centre for integration and regulation of (my) thoughts, (my) feelings and (my) actions with (my) conscious mental imagery as foundation stones. Imagery vividness, a combination of clarity and liveliness, is essential to imagining, remembering, thinking, predicting, planning and acting. Assessment of vividness using introspective report is validated by objective means such as fMRI. A significant body of work shows that vividness of visual imagery is determined by the similarity of neural responses in imagery to those occurring in perception of actual objects and performance of activities. I am Conscious, therefore I am.

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Individual ratings of vividness predict aesthetic appeal in poetry.

Cited by 47 publications

References 70 publications

The default-mode network represents aesthetic appeal that generalizes across visual domains

The default-mode network represents aesthetic appeal that generalizes across visual domains

Kitsch and Perception: Towards a New ‘Aesthetic from Below’

I am Conscious, Therefore I am: Imagery, Affect, Action, and a General Theory of Behaviour

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