Visual preference for abstract curvature and for interior spaces: Beyond undergraduate student samples.

Palumbo, Letizia; Rampone, Giulia; Bertamini, Marco; Sinico, Michele; Clarke, Eleanor; Vartanian, Oshin

doi:10.1037/aca0000359

Cited by 19 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 87 publications

(163 reference statements)

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“…Conversely, contour had no effect on judgements of beauty among nonexperts, but they were more likely to enter curvilinear spaces than rectilinear ones. However, a more recent study did not confirm preference for curved interior spaces with quasi-experts in industrial design ( Palumbo et al, 2020 ), hence highlighting that individual differences might also depend on the specific training received in the area of expertise. Cotter et al (2017) also reported that artistic expertise, a personality trait such as openness to experience, along with other cognitive traits (i.e., holistic thinking) predicted higher preference for curvature using irregular polygons, but not using arrays of circles and hexagons.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Shape familiarity modulates preference for curvature in drawings of common-use objects

Chuquichambi

Palumbo

Rey

et al. 2021

PeerJ

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Drawing is a way to represent common-use objects. The contour of an object is a salient feature that defines its identity. Preference for a contour (curved or angular) may depend on how familiar the resulting shape looks for that given object. In this research, we examined the influence of shape familiarity on preference for curved or sharp-angled drawings of common-use objects. We also examined the possibility that some individual differences modulated this preference. Preference for curvature was assessed with a liking rating task (Experiment 1) and with a two-alternative forced-choice task simulating approach/avoidance responses (Experiment 2). Shape familiarity was assessed with a familiarity selection task where participants selected the most familiar shape between the curved and the angular version for each object, or whether both shapes were equally familiar for the object. We found a consistent preference for curvature in both experiments. This preference increased when the objects with a curved shape were selected as the most familiar ones. We also found preference for curvature when participants selected the shape of objects as equally familiar. However, there was no preference for curvature or preference for angularity when participants selected the sharp-angled shapes as the most familiar ones. In Experiment 2, holistic and affective types of intuition predicted higher preference for curvature. Conversely, participants with higher scores in the unconventionality facet showed less preference for the curved drawings. We conclude that shape familiarity and individual characteristics modulate preference for curvature.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Shape familiarity modulates preference for curvature in drawings of common-use objects

Chuquichambi

Palumbo

Rey

et al. 2021

PeerJ

Self Cite

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“…The data for this study were collected by Palumbo et al (2020) in the context of a larger study involving additional non-architectural stimuli. Here we will only describe the method relevant to the present analysis.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In turn, Palumbo et al (2020) extended the study of preference for curvature in architecture to two theoretically-relevant groups, namely persons with autism spectrum disorder and design quasi-experts. Regarding the former, Belin et al (2017) had found that unlike participants with neurotypical development, persons with autism spectrum disorder reported positive feelings with jagged-edged stimuli.…”

Section: Individual Differencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition, regarding expertise in architecture and design, Vartanian et al (2019) had demonstrated that experts in architecture and design exhibit a different preference profile for curvature depending on the task. To determine whether the same effect could be extended to quasi-experts-defined as people with some but not expert-level background and training in the domain (Kozbelt & Kaufman, 2014;Silvia, 2006)-Palumbo et al (2020 also collected data from university-level students of industrial design. In Experiment 1 they administered the same two tasks as Vartanian et al (2013) using a subset of the original stimuli to a neurotypical sample (i.e., control) and persons with autism spectrum disorder.…”

Section: Individual Differencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recall that based on a subset of 80 stimuli from Vartanian et al (2013), Palumbo et al (2020) had collected data from neurotypical controls, persons with autism spectrum disorder, and university-level design students on two tasks: Liking judgments and approach-avoidance decisions. Based on the research subsequently conducted by Coburn et al (2020), we had access to PCA-derived scores for Coherence, Fascination, and Hominess for each of those 80 stimuli.…”

Section: Present Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Individual differences in preference for architectural interiors

Vartanian

Navarrete

Palumbo

et al. 2021

Journal of Environmental Psychology

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Preference for architectural interiors can be explained using three psychological dimensions: Coherence (ease for organizing and comprehending a scene), Fascination (a scene's informational richness and generated interest), and Hominess (how much a space feels personal). We tested the hypothesis that their contributions to preference might vary based on individual differences by analyzing data from design students, participants with autism spectrum disorder, and neurotypical controls who rated images of interiors on liking and approach-avoidance decisions. For design students, only Coherence drove choices, whereas in participants with autism spectrum disorder and neurotypical controls Hominess and Fascination also contributed, respectively. Coherence is paramount for design students because it references the structural organization of spaces, and is informed by formal training. For autism spectrum disorder, Hominess matters because preference for familiarity, physical proximity, and difficulty in mental simulation are relevant to that population, whereas interest in visual exploration can explain Fascination's role in neurotypical controls.☆ The data collection for this work was supported by internal research funding from Liverpool Hope University to the third author. We would like to thank 'Autism Together' for their help with participants' recruitment and all the individuals with autism for taking part in the study. We would also like to thank Giulia Rampone, Marco Bertamini, Michele Sinico and Eleanor Clarke for data sharing.

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The Interplay of Objective and Subjective Factors in Empirical Aesthetics

Chamberlain

2022

Human Perception of Visual Information

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The field of empirical aesthetics sets out to understand and predict our aesthetic preferences . Its history dates back to the birth of visual psychophysics and the work of Gustav Fechner (1876), while multiple models of aesthetic experience have been proposed in the intervening years (Chatterjee & Vartanian, 2014;Leder et al., 2004;Pelowski et al., 2017). This chapter briefly sets out the history of empirical aesthetics, and the state of the research field at present. I outline recent work on inter-observer agreement in aesthetic preference, before presenting empirical work that argues the importance of first objective (characteristics of stimuli) and then subjective (characteristics of context) factors in shaping aesthetic preference. Considering the role of properties of the stimulus, I will review literature on the relationship between aesthetic preference and symmetry, shape, compositional structure, colour and complexity as well as considering the potential role of statistical properties of images. I will then review putative subjective predictors of aesthetic preference including the role of context, framing and the influence of information about the artist and the artistic process. Both subjective and objective approaches will be evaluated from an individual differences perspective, focusing on the mediating role of familiarity, expertise, culture, cognitive ability and personality. Finally, I will attempt to draw these approaches together with reference to aesthetic sensitivity: an individual observer's propensity to have an aesthetic response to a particular objective image characteristic, and will explore some putative factors that may modulate and explain individual differences in aesthetic sensitivity.providing the foundation for later efforts to establish lawful relationships between stimulus properties and aesthetic preferences (Birkhoff, 1933;Eysenck, 1940) with reference to psychobiological mechanisms of arousal (Berlyne, 1974). Such efforts focused on the predictive value of low-level stimulus properties, such as colour, symmetry, proportion, contrast, contour, and later on collative properties such as order, complexity and ambiguity (Berlyne, 1974). Such an approach remains common in empirical aesthetics. However, more recent research in the field has placed focus on sensory and cognitive processing dynamics, modelling how observers respond to salient properties of the stimulus (Flavell et al., 2020;Reber et al., 2004), but also incorporating the sensory and cognitive history of the observer (Cutting, 2003;Zajonc, 1968). The latter approach highlights the critical role subjective aspects such as context and exposure play in shaping our aesthetic experiences. Objective and subjective perspectives have been brought together in comprehensive aesthetic models in recent years, bringing both psychological and neuroscientific understanding to the numerous objective and subjective mechanisms identified by researchers in the field (

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Visual preference for abstract curvature and for interior spaces: Beyond undergraduate student samples.

Cited by 19 publications

References 87 publications

Shape familiarity modulates preference for curvature in drawings of common-use objects

Shape familiarity modulates preference for curvature in drawings of common-use objects

Individual differences in preference for architectural interiors

The Interplay of Objective and Subjective Factors in Empirical Aesthetics

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