People Experience Different Emotions from Melancholic and Grieving Music

Abstract

Two behavioral studies are reported that ask whether listeners experience different emotions in response to melancholic and grieving musical passages. In the first study, listeners were asked to rate the extent that musical passages made them feel positive and negative, as well as to identify which emotion(s) they felt from a list of 24 emotions. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that listeners experience different emotions when listening to melancholic and grieving music. The second study asked listeners to spontaneously describe their emotional states while listening to music. Content analysis was conducted in order to find any underlying dimensions of the identified responses. The analysis replicated the finding that melancholic and grieving music led to different feelings states, with melancholic music leading to feelings of Sad/Melancholy/Depressed, Reflective/Nostalgic, Rain/Dreary Weather, and Relaxed/Calm, while grieving music led to feelings of Anticipation/Uneasy, Tension/Intensity, Crying/Distraught/Turmoil, Death/Loss, and Epic/Dramatic/Cinematic.