Abstract
Aesthetic experiences have an influence on many aspects of life. Interest in the neural basis of aesthetic experiences has grown rapidly in the past decade, and fMRI studies have identified several brain systems supporting aesthetic experiences. Work on the rapid neuronal dynamics of aesthetic experience, however, is relatively scarce. This study adds to this field by investigating the experience of being aesthetically moved by means of ERP and time-frequency analysis. Participants' EEG was recorded while they viewed a diverse set of artworks and evaluated the extent to which these artworks moved them. Results show that being aesthetically moved is associated with a sustained increase in gamma activity over centroparietal regions. In addition, alpha power over right frontocentral regions was reduced in high- and low-moving images, compared to artworks given intermediate ratings. We interpret the gamma effect as an indication for sustained savoring processes for aesthetically moving artworks compared to aesthetically less-moving artworks. The alpha effect is interpreted as an indication of increased attention for aesthetically salient images. In contrast to previous works, we observed no significant effects in any of the established ERP components, but we did observe effects at latencies longer than 1 sec. We conclude that EEG time-frequency analysis provides useful information on the neuronal dynamics of aesthetic experience.
Highlights
The concept of aesthetic experience has a long tradition within scientific and humanistic literature, with early accounts going back to philosophers such as Baumgarten (1750), Kant (1790) and Hume (1757)
We argue that oscillatory neuronal activity forms a promising approach to better understand the neural basis of aesthetic experiences, as oscillatory dynamics have been effectively related to the coupling and uncoupling of functional networks in the brain (Bastiaansen, Mazaheri, & Jensen, 2012), and can be examined over longer timescales
No significant differences were found in the event-related potentials (ERPs) contrasts between LO versus MOD, nor for HI versus LO, Figure 2 seems to suggest that HI and LO categories consistently elicit larger positivity than MOD through the 1-5 s interval after stimulus onset
Summary
The concept of aesthetic experience has a long tradition within scientific and humanistic literature, with early accounts going back to philosophers such as Baumgarten (1750), Kant (1790) and Hume (1757). With respect to the EEG literature in particular, most studies have examined event-related potentials (ERPs) evoked by aesthetically appealing (versus unappealing) stimuli and have sought to link specific ERP components to various stages of aesthetic processing. These efforts (reviewed below) have resulted in substantial insights into the neuronal dynamics of aesthetic experiences, both in terms of their constituent processes (i.e. perception, attention and emotion) and the order in which these processes occur
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