Anger, disgust, and the negative aesthetic emotions: Expanding an appraisal model of aesthetic experience.

Abstract

Negative aesthetic emotions, such as disgust and anger, are central to understanding why people reject, deface, and censor art. Psychological theories of aesthetic preferences have little to say about negative aesthetic emotions, however, and the major theories associated with Berlyne and Martindale cannot in principle explain emotions like anger and disgust. The present research uses a recent appraisal model of aesthetic emotions to illuminate negative responses to art. People viewed a set of pictures, which included offensive and controversial works. The predictions were based on the appraisal profiles of anger and disgust. As expected, anger was associated with appraising a picture as incongruent with one's values and as intentionally offensive, and disgust was associated with appraising a picture as incongruent with one's values and as unpleasant. Implications for competing theories of aesthetic emotions are considered.

The effects of visual context and individual differences on perception and evaluation of modern art and graffiti art

“…Attitudes play an important role for aesthetic appreciation, especially for styles that are potentially controversial. Modern art (Silvia & Brown, 2007), as well as graffiti art (Keizer et al, 2008;McAuliffe & Iveson, 2011) are both highly debated genres. Modern artworks might elicit strong emotions from transformative/insightful experiences (Pelowski & Akiba, 2011) up to facing destruction by upset visitors (Silvia & Brown, 2007) and graffiti art is sometimes made responsible for the downward drift of neighborhoods (Wilson & Kelling, 1982).…”

Confusion and interest: The role of knowledge emotions in aesthetic experience.

“…But people have a wide range of aesthetic experiences, and theories of aesthetic pleasure do not always explain unusual states well. Some unusual states are well-known in other fields but haven't attracted the attention of aesthetics researchers; emotions such as anger (Silvia & Brown, 2007), disgust (Cooper & Silvia, 2009), and surprise (Ludden et al, 2009) are good examples. Other unusual states are complicated human experiences that are hard to pin down, such as aesthetic chills (McCrae, 2007), the experience of beauty (Armstrong & Detweiler-Bedell, 2008), and feelings of awe, thrills, and being moved (Konecni, 2005).…”

A Pattern Analysis Application: Time Series Traces of the Effect of Kamran Khavarani’s Paintings on Viewers’ Mood

“…Acknowledgments: (1) We acknowledge competent and dedicated research assistance of Ms. Enkeleda Cuko.…”

“…The empirical research also indicates that when viewers of paintings perceive them beautiful, their brain is stimulated. Among them are: Cela-Conde (2004), Kemp and Cupchick (2007), Silvia (2007), a Joint study by Johns Hopkins Brain and Mind Center and the Walter Museum (2010), for which we have found no journal publication record, Lacey and associates (2011), Tsuklura and Gabeza (2011), Ishuzi and Zeki (2011), Vessel [2013, and Vartanian and Skov [2014].…”

“…Nonetheless, their findings are congruent with the theoretical aesthetic literature we have reviewed. Silvia and Brown (2007) also used a survey method with similar sample limitations. Their sample included fifty-eight (58) undergraduate students.…”