On 18 September John E. Drury, independent researcher, will give a talk on Valence, cognition, and the music of the spheres at Linnaeus University.
Time: 14.15-15.30
Location: Sven (Fe2038b), Department of Swedish, Linnaeus University, or zoom:
https://lnu-se.zoom.us/j/65129630125?pwd=W2OtxtIu9wJRytnGz8RYxynzRuKSsa.1
Abstract
Relationships between affective valence and the consonance/dissonance of simultaneously or sequentially expressed musical notes (intervals) have been contemplated since antiquity. Studies using event related brain potentials (ERPs) have demonstrated that music-induced affective states can prime visually presented words, suggesting a lexical-semantic locus of such effects.
In this talk I'll share some data from an EEG study (w/S. Eggleston & C. Stevens) testing adult participants (N=22) presented with auditory/visual pairs of stimuli comprised of: (i) two-note musical intervals followed by (ii) visually presented single English words. Participants made forced-choice relatedness judgments for each interval/word pair. Target word emotional valence varied continuously from negative (PAIN/DOOM/ANGST) to positive (GOOD/JOY/FUN). Every target was encountered twice, with counterbalanced repetitions differing in whether the preceding musical interval was relatively more consonant/dissonant.
Relatedness judgments replicate patterns previously shown for ratings of intervals presented in isolation. A more narrow look at these behavioral data suggests our visual stimuli provided an implicit valence scale to which our participants reliably mapped the relative consonance/dissonance of the musical primes. ERP analyses revealed Consonance x Valence interactions due to asymmetries in the laterality of responses for positive/consonance versus negative/dissonance priming, in particular anterior right hemispheric effects for negative target words that were absent for positive targets. Interestingly these response patterns were qualitatively different -- and arose earlier than -- previously documented music/language priming ERP effects. I'll discuss the demands these data impose on models of visual word form recognition, and how different perspectives on the relationship between affective valence and visual-spatial attention may contribute to explaining both the present data and previous observations in this domain.
Contact: Annika Andersson, Linnaeus University, annika.anderssonlnuse