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Copyright

Dragan Janković; Maja Mađarev;

Published On

2024-06-20

Page Range

pp. 27–46

Language

  • English

Print Length

20 pages

2. The Role of Affective Dimensions in the Aesthetic Experience of Music

Chapter of: Psychological Perspectives on Musical Experiences and Skills: Research in the Western Balkans and Western Europe(pp. 27–46)
A theoretical model is proposed, and two studies are conducted to test the hypothesis that aesthetic experiences may originate from a few basic mechanisms of affective processing related to emotion dimensions and cognitive evaluation. The results of the first study confirmed that aesthetic experience is strongly related to affective valence (pleasantness) and cognitive evaluation (familiarity) and moderately related to arousal. The results of the second study confirmed that the aesthetic experience of music can be substantially explained by the affective experience of meanings that are activated or constructed in the listener’s mind. The results indicate that people like music that activates pleasant, arousing, and familiar meanings. These results align with our proposal of a Valence, Arousal, and Cognitive evaluation (VACe) model of the aesthetic experience of music.

Contributors

Dragan Janković

(author)
Assistant Professor at University of Belgrade
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0863-5636

Dragan Janković is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade. He received his PhD in psychology from the University of Belgrade in 2015. He teaches several BA, MA, and PhD courses in developmental psychology, psychology of emotions, and psychology of art. His research focuses mainly on affective processing, multisensory perception, developmental psychology, and empirical aesthetics, with a special interest in visual arts and music. He is a member of he Regional Network Psychology and Music (RNPaM).

Maja Mađarev

(author)
Research Assistant at University of Belgrade

Maja Mađarev graduated from the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade. She is a Research Assistant at the Laboratory of Experimental Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, and a Teaching Assistant at Developmental Psychology and Psychology of Art courses. Her main fields of interest are psychological aesthetics and affective processing.