Subjects: Psychology >> Cognitive Psychology submitted time 2020-10-04
Abstract： " Background. Aesthetic judgement ability of art appears to change with artistic training. Previous studies have already been demonstrate some differences between experts and laypersons when it comes to the appreciating of aesthetic stimulus (music, movies, and western oil paintings). However, to date, there has not yet been systematic research on whether art expertise modulates aesthetic processing of traditional Chinese paintings, especially the neural mechanisms is lacking. Method. The current study set out to investigate whether and how aesthetic evaluation of Chinese paintings are modulated by art expertise. To this end, thirty participants, 15 art experts and 15 laypersons (mean age = 22.3 ± 2.46 years old) were enrolled in the experiment to assess 20 Chinese paintings with different types of aesthetic qualities (10 high-beauty vs. 10 low-beauty ones). Participants were asked to accomplish Chinese paintings for beauty and liking judgment tasks on 5-point scales, as well as oxygenated hemoglobin concentration (Hbo) responses were recorded in prefrontal cortex (PFC) and right temporo-parietal junction (r-TPJ) by functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The inter-subject correlation (ISC) and intra-brain functional connectivity (FC) were calculated in two groups during free viewing of the Chinese paintings. Results. Behaviorally, all participants showed more positive response to high-beauty Chinese paintings than low-beauty paintings and this founding both for beauty and for liking ratings. However, few differences in ratings were observed between experts and laypersons. Nevertheless, profound differences in fNIRS parameters were observed in aesthetic processing between experts and laypersons. Firstly, a higher ISC in experts than laypersons was observed in appreciating low-beauty paintings, including the left middle frontal cortex (CH14) and right superior parietal gyrus (CH24). This groups discrepancies indicated that experts seem to consistently pungent the fatal flaws of low-beauty paintings than laypersons. Moreover, there was a lower ISC during experts appreciating high-beauty paintings than appreciating low-beauty paintings in the CH14. Importantly, our results detected that the ISC in CH14 was significantly negatively correlated with experts’ beauty ratings. These findings suggested that experts’ neural activity allows to distinguish the quality of Chinese paintings. Conversely, laypersons’ ISC was failed to separate the good from the bad on Chinese paintings because we did not find an ISC difference between high-beauty paintings and low-beauty paintings, neither did any correlate with aesthetic rating detected. Secondly, experts showed a stronger functional connectivity in right TPJ compared to the laypersons. Proposed explanation for this is that the experts could conjure up more associative thoughts and try to understanding the intentions of painters during appreciating paintings, which was accompanied by enhanced connectivity in the brain areas related to theory of mind. Conclusion. Considering the art-related expertise on aesthetic appreciation discussion in aesthetic psychology, the present study achieved to combined traditional Chinese paintings concerning expertise difference with neurophysiological correlates. Our results further extend the evidence of art expertise knowledge help to aesthetic evaluation, with experts significant increased ISC in left middle frontal cortex and intra-brain FC in right-TPJ. " "
Peer Review Status:
Awaiting Review
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