Abstract
Several studies have investigated emotional reactions to instrumental music. However, studies on the effect of lyrics on emotions are limited. Previous studies suggest that the importance of lyrics may vary cross-culturally. The aim of this study was twofold: to investigate the effects of lyrics on aroused emotions and psychological mechanisms with music and to explore whether these differ cross-culturally. Fifty participants from Portugal and Sweden listened to six musical stimuli based on two songs, one representing each culture. These were presented in three versions each: the original, an instrumental, and the instrumental version with lyrics on the screen. The Portuguese and Swedish participants differed notably: the presence of lyrics did not affect listeners’ happiness in neither group as predicted, but did increase sadness, albeit only in the Portuguese group. Lyrics also increased nostalgia for the Portuguese listeners as predicted and surprise-astonishment for the Swedish listeners. Regarding the mechanisms, lyrics increased the activation of episodic memory in both groups, and the activation of evaluative conditioning, contagion, and visual imagery in the Portuguese group. The present study indicates that lyrics have an effect on musical emotions and mechanisms which vary between groups of different cultural backgrounds.
Highlights
Several studies have investigated emotional reactions to instrumental music
Empirical studies testing the application of this framework have focused on investigating the psychological mechanisms that underlie the induction of musical emotions, in order to reveal the causes of these emotions (e.g., Juslin et al, 2014, 2015)
A two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), with “lyrics” and “music origin” as factors, on familiarity ratings for each group, indicated that familiarity was higher for the congruent piece in both groups, as expected, F(1, 24) = 17.63, p < .001, ηp2 = .42, for the Portuguese group, and F(1, 24) = 270.60, p < .001, ηp2 = .92, for the Swedish group
Summary
Several studies have investigated emotional reactions to instrumental music. studies on the effect of lyrics on emotions are limited. The aim of this study was twofold: to investigate the effects of lyrics on aroused emotions and psychological mechanisms with music and to explore whether these differ cross-culturally. A comprehensive approach for explaining how music arouses emotions is described in the BRECVEMA framework This theoretical model features eight mechanisms, which are considered to underlie the induction of musical emotions: brain stem reflex, rhythmic entrainment, evaluative conditioning, emotional contagion, visual imagery, episodic memory, musical expectancy, and aesthetic judgment. In addition to these eight mechanisms, there is the default emotioninduction mechanism, cognitive appraisal (see Juslin, 2013; Juslin & Västfjäll, 2008). By using instrumental music as experimental stimuli, such studies have selectively studied the effect of music, as opposed to the combined effect of musical and lyrical content on emotions
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