Is it the picture or is it the frame? An fMRI study on the neurobiology of framing effects.

Sarita Silveira,Katrin Elvers,Aline Vedder,Kai Fehse,Kristina Hennig-Fast

doi:10.3389/fnhum.2015.00528

Abstract

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) we investigated whether a culturally defined context modulates the neurocognitive processing of artworks. We presented subjects with paintings from the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, and labeled them as being either from the MoMA or from an adult education center. Irrespective of aesthetic appreciation, we found higher neural activation in the left precuneus, superior and inferior parietal cortex for the MoMA condition compared to the control label condition. When taking the aesthetic preference for a painting into account, the MoMA condition elicited higher involvement of right precuneus, bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), and temporoparietal junction (TPJ). Our findings indicate that mental frames, in particular labels of social value, modulate both cognitive and affective aspects of sensory processing.

Highlights

The context, in which sensory input is derived, constitutes a mental frame that determines our relationship to our cultural environment on an implicit level of processing (Pöppel and Bao, 2011)
When aesthetic rating was included as a parametric regressor, i.e., when taking aesthetic appreciation of the presented paintings into account, there was a higher activation for the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) label
For positive aesthetic ratings there was an increase of metabolism in the bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), the right precuneus and in the bilateral temporoparietal junction (TPJ) (Table 1B; Figure 1B)

Summary

Introduction

The context, in which sensory input is derived, constitutes a mental frame that determines our relationship to our cultural environment on an implicit level of processing (Pöppel and Bao, 2011). Evidence highlights the role of prefrontal, temporal, and parietal brain regions in framing effects, which can be associated with working memory, social cognition, and imagery (Bhatt and Camerer, 2005; Gonzalez et al, 2005; Windmann et al, 2006; Deppe et al, 2007; Avram et al, 2014; Fehse et al, 2015). This study aims at a deeper understanding of framing effects on sensory information processing by further elucidating the ways in which social and cultural factors influence or even determine the visual processing of artworks. On the one hand visual information is analyzed bottom-up in terms of psychophysical properties; on the other hand prior experiences and expectations take top-down influence on

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Conclusion