There Are No Aesthetic Emotions: Comment on Menninghaus Et Al

Psychological Review

COMMENTARY

There Are No Aesthetic Emotions: Comment on Menninghaus et al. (2019)

Martin Skov Marcos Nadal Copenhagen University Hospital Hvidovre, Hvidovre, Denmark, University of the Balearic Islands and Copenhagen Business School

Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) have recently argued that aesthetic emotions constitute a distinct class of emotions. They claim that aesthetic emotions are distinct because they involve an aesthetic evaluation, they are tuned to specific aesthetic virtues, they involve subjectively felt pleasure or displeasure, and predict liking or disliking. Here we examine the theory in the light of psychological and neurobiological empirical findings. We show that Menninghaus and colleagues failed to provide evidence that aesthetic emotions are different than other kinds of emotions in terms of psychological components or neurobiological underpinnings. We present empirical evidence that strongly suggests that affective states observed during aesthetic appreciation events are not distinctly different from affective states observed during other forms of sensory valuation. We conclude that it may be time to retire the idea that aesthetic emotions constitute a special class of human emotions.

Keywords: aesthetic emotion, aesthetics, emotion, liking, pleasure

Aesthetic emotions have puzzled psychologists for over a cen- The very concept of aesthetic emotions entails that they can be tury (Bain, 1883; Dewey, 1893; James, 1890; Külpe, 1895; Ribot, distinguished from nonaesthetic emotions. To accept the concept 1897; Sully, 1892). It seemed obvious to early psychologists that of aesthetic emotions is to accept that the adjective aesthetic aesthetic emotions were part of the human emotional repertoire. denotes a meaningful class of emotions that are defined by distinct But the task of identifying what defines them was far from properties. But what exactly does aesthetic mean? In what way straightforward: Is it that they are elicited by fine art (Bain, 1883) does the adjective aesthetic modify the noun emotion? What or beauty (Sully, 1892)? Is it that they lack the physiological quality does aesthetic confer to emotion? Psychologists and neu- changes that accompany other emotions (James, 1890)? Is it that roscientists have taken the following three positions in answer to they lack clear social or adaptive functions (Ribot, 1897; Sully, these questions. 1892)? Decades of subsequent theoretical and empirical work have returned no consensus on what aesthetic emotions are, nor on what makes them distinctive. There is even no general agreement that Position 1: There Are No Distinct Aesthetic Emotions they exist in the first place. Nonetheless, the notion of aesthetic The human brain includes emotion systems that evolved be- emotions is clearly alluring because, despite the disagreement and cause they favored survival: they promoted behaviors that contrib- uncertainty, it continues to hold sway (e.g., Carbon, 2018; Leder, uted to homeostatic regulation, to locating mates and resources, Markey, & Pelowski, 2015; Makin, 2017; Oatley, 2003; Pelowski and to avoiding danger and harm. These same systems, in Homo & Akiba, 2011; Pelowski, Forster, Tinio, Scholl, & Leder, 2017; sapiens, also regulate complex behaviors that are not directly tied This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its alliedPelowski, publishers. Markey, Forster, Gerger, & Leder, 2017; Schindler et to survival, as well as our experience of nature and cultural objects. This article is intended solely for the personal use ofal., the individual user and is 2017 not to be disseminated broadly. ; Silvia, 2005b). Emotions in response to landscapes, art, design, or interior archi- What makes aesthetic emotions—if they indeed exist—difficult tecture, are the result of neurochemical processes that evolved to pin down is their unsettled relation to other classes of emotions. serving other, nonaesthetic, biologically adaptive functions. Re- searchers who subscribe to this position are interested in such questions as: How it is possible for music to induce states of X Martin Skov, Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance, Co- sadness even though music pieces have no social consequences in penhagen University Hospital Hvidovre, Hvidovre, Denmark, and Decision and of themselves (Brattico et al., 2016; Eerola, Vuoskoski, Pel- Neuroscience Research Cluster, Copenhagen Business School; Marcos tola, Putkinen, & Schäfer, 2018; Sachs, Damasio, & Habibi, Nadal, Human Evolution and Cognition Group, University of the Balearic 2015)? How does the human brain use neurobiological processes Islands. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Martin associated with adaptive hedonic valuation to determine the aes- Skov, Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance, Copenhagen Uni- thetic value of objects with little discernible biological relevance, versity Hospital Hvidovre, Section 714, Kettegaards Alle 30, DK-2650 such as symmetrical facades, abstract paintings, iPhones, or pop Hvidovre, Denmark. E-mail: [email protected] songs (Skov, 2019b)?

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Position 2: Aesthetic Emotions Are Everyday are they related to the human brain’s other emotional Emotions in a Different Presentation systems? Researchers who endorse this position, like those endorsing Advocates of Position 3 have rarely addressed these questions. Position 1, believe that human emotions evolved because they Rather, they usually simply assume that such a distinct class of promoted biological functions. But they also believe that certain emotions exists. This is why Menninghaus and colleagues’ (2019) experiential contexts, which they refer to as “aesthetic,” modulate thorough account of aesthetic emotions as a distinct class is such some aspects of those emotions. Specifically, aesthetic emotions a welcome contribution. In contrast to other existing theories of are seen as general emotions that have lost their motivational or aesthetic emotions (e.g., Konecˇni, 2005; Perlovsky, 2014; Silvia, behavioral relevance because they occur in the safety of an aes- 2005a), Menninghaus and colleagues try to define what makes an thetic context. For instance, these researchers suggest that, when in emotion aesthetic, outlining their constitutive components in con- response to art, negative emotions such as sadness or fear are crete terms, and providing an explanation for how they come about attenuated or even can be accompanied by feelings of pleasure and how they relate to other classes of emotion. Menninghaus and (Andrade & Cohen, 2007; Eerola et al., 2018; Mocaiber et al., colleagues’ proposal, therefore, allows for a systematic assessment 2010; Van Dongen, Van Strien, & Dijkstra, 2016). From this of the case for aesthetic emotions as a special category and of how perspective, aesthetic pleasure is different from the pleasure of well it fits with empirical findings in current psychology and primary reinforcers, such as food or sex (Christensen, 2017), neuroscience. because it involves the hedonic component of emotions (liking), In the following text, we examine this case by assessing to what but not their motivational component (wanting; Chatterjee, 2013, degree Menninghaus et al. (2019) succeeded in answering the 2014; Chatterjee & Vartanian, 2016. But see Nadal & Skov, 2018; preceding two questions. Our conclusion is that they did not Skov & Nadal, 2018). succeed and that their theory fails to make a convincing case for the existence of a special class of aesthetic emotions. We show Position 3: Aesthetic Emotions Are a Distinct Class how current empirical evidence strongly favors a view of aesthetic of Emotions emotions that aligns better with either Position 1 or Position 2. We also find that there is little reason to believe that the conceptual This position advocates that aesthetic emotions are different structure of Menninghaus and colleagues’ definition will find from other nonaesthetic emotions in fundamental aspects, either by support in future experimental findings. being special in nature or by having special functional properties. For example, some researchers have argued that aesthetic emotions refer to distinct emotional states, such as beauty, awe, the sublime, Menninghaus and Colleagues’ (2019) Conception of being moved, or elevated (Carbon, 2018, 2019; Makin, 2017; Aesthetic Emotions Pelowski, 2015; Schindler et al., 2017; Vessel, Starr, & Rubin, Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) conceived of aesthetic 2012). Such distinct aesthetic emotions are thought to arise when emotions as “a special class of discrete emotions” (p. 172)—that is, humans experience art or when we engage in aesthetic apprecia- emotions that differ in important ways from nonaesthetic emotion of objects. These aesthetic emotions are portrayed as intense, tions. What makes aesthetic emotions distinctive, according to leading in certain circumstances to states of rapture or insight Menninghaus et al., is the fundamental role they play in aesthetic (Carbon, 2019; Makin, 2017; Pelowski & Akiba, 2011). They are appreciation events: “They are appreciative of specific aesthetic also often considered to be rare: Pelowski and colleagues’ (2019) virtues, such as the power of an artwork to move, fascinate, and survey revealed that about 40% of people have never experienced surprise us, and predictive of overall liking” (p. 175). There are the sublime, and that, of those who have, only about 30% have four mandatory features that define an emotion as aesthetic and experienced the sublime more than once a year. distinguish it from other, nonaesthetic emotions: The third position is clearly the least parsimonious. It argues that aesthetic emotions constitute a distinct class of emotions with its 1. Aesthetic emotions “always include an aesthetic evaluation/ own characteristic functional, behavioral, and physiological fea- appreciation” of objects or events (p. 171). tures. It requires, therefore, experimental evidence showing just

This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its alliedhow publishers. aesthetic emotions are different from regular emotions. It 2. Each different aesthetic emotion is “tuned to, and

This article is intended solely for the personal use ofrequires, the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. at least, satisfactory answers to the following two ques- predictive of, a specific type of aesthetic virtue . . . , or, tions: defined in subjective terms, a specific type of aesthetic appeal” (p. 172). 1. First, there is the question of psychological characterization. If aesthetic emotions constitute a distinct class, their 3. Aesthetic emotions are “associated with subjectively functional and behavioral features must be identified: felt pleasure or displeasure during the emotional epi- What defines an emotion as aesthetic? How many aes- sode” (p. 172). thetic emotions are there? What sets their constitutive components apart from other emotions? 4. Aesthetic emotions “are an important (though certainly not the only) predictor of resultant liking or 2. Second, there is the question of neurobiological charac- disliking” (p. 172). terization. If distinct, aesthetic emotions must arise from the activity of distinct neural systems: Which are these The nuances of Menninghaus and colleagues’ (2019) definition systems? What are their computational principles? How become clear with an example. The authors presented the emotion 642 SKOV AND NADAL

of being moved as an exemplary aesthetic emotion. Many objects a psychological characterization of aesthetic emotions, and then or events, such as weddings, funerals, births, or farewells can be examine the degree to which it is able to establish a neurobiolog- experienced as moving. In this sense, being moved is an everyday ical characterization. emotion. It is also possible for artworks portraying such objects and events to produce the emotional state of being moved. In this sense, being moved is an art-elicited emotion. Being moved is an The Question of Psychological Characterization aesthetic emotion only when it is intertwined with the appreciation If aesthetic emotions constitute a distinct and special class of of the aesthetic virtues of that object or event. Being moved “can emotions, it is necessary to describe, in psychological terms, what be an ‘everyday’ emotion, an art-elicited emotion in the broader makes them different from other classes of emotions and what sense, and, to the extent that it directly predicts aesthetic appreci- makes them special. The case for aesthetic emotions can only be ation, an aesthetic emotion in the narrower sense” (p. 177). Thus, relevant to psychology and neuroscience if it specifies concrete what defines an emotion as aesthetic is its functional role as part of criteria for verification (i.e., criteria that can be assessed and, the appreciation of aesthetic virtues. Being moved can be a nonaes- possibly, investigated). thetic emotion in one circumstance and an aesthetic emotion in Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) developed their view of another, provided that it is elicited as part of a specific aesthetic aesthetic emotions from multicomponent models of emotion, appreciation “processing routine” (p. 173). closely mirroring Scherer’s (2005, 2009) architecture. Scherer The key element, thus, in Menninghaus et al.’s (2019) definition (2005) defined an emotion as “an episode of interrelated, synchro- is the notion of aesthetic appreciation. But what, then, defines an nized changes in the states of all or most of the five organismic aesthetic appreciation? Menninghaus et al. (2019) describe aes- subsystems in response to the evaluation of an external or internal thetic appreciation as a specific type of valuation where an object stimulus event as relevant to major concerns of the organism” is appraised with regard to an “aesthetic virtue” (p. 172) and where (Scherer, 2005, p. 697 [italics in the original]). The five systems the result is a feeling of liking or disliking for the object. It is its correspond to five emotion components: cognitive component (ap- participation in the unfolding of such aesthetic appreciation events praisals), neurophysiological component (bodily changes), motiva- that qualifies an emotion as aesthetic. Thus, aesthetic emotions are tional component (action tendencies), motor expression component elicited by a broad diversity of objects and events that are ap- (facial and vocal expression), and subjective feeling component (emo- praised in terms of aesthetic virtues and contribute to the experi- tional experience; Scherer, 2005, 2009). ence of the pleasure or displeasure associated with liking or Thus, in order to make their case for aesthetic emotions as a disliking. distinct class of emotions, Menninghaus and colleagues’ (2019) In Menninghaus et al.’s (2019) theory, aesthetic emotions are should establish two facts: first, that aesthetic emotions are indeed not “basic” emotions, that is to say, states elicited by a particular emotions that involve synchronized changes in all or most of the set of stimuli that have an unique neural “fingerprint” (Barrett, five emotion components, and second, that aesthetic emotions 2017)—with a distinct biochemical signature, a dedicated neural differ in an important way from nonaesthetic emotions in one or circuit, and specific physiological and behavioral expressions. more of the components, or in the interactions among the compo- Rather, any emotion that provides “emotional coloring” (Menning- nents, making them psychologically distinct in a meaningful man- haus et al., 2019, p. 174) to the appreciation of an object’s aesthetic ner. “virtue” is an aesthetic emotion. As a result, anything that is First, did Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) show that aes- thought to qualify as an aesthetic virtue can elicit a corresponding thetic emotions involve synchronized changes in all or most of the aesthetic emotion. Menninghaus et al. (2019) identified two ways five emotion components? To answer this question, we focus on aesthetic emotions are designated: “Aesthetic emotion terms are being moved, which Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) presented formed either by superimposing an aesthetically evaluative mean- as the exemplary aesthetic emotion. The authors cited four studies ing on emotion terms (e.g., an emotionally moving film, a fasci- to back their claim that “labeling a speech or an artwork as moving nating book) or by superimposing an emotional meaning on pro- does indeed entail a genuine aesthetically evaluative dimension totypical aesthetic virtue terms (e.g., feelings of beauty)” (p. 185). and that this aesthetic emotion dimension allows for a straightfor- The first class is said to draw on “ordinary” emotions (Menning- ward empirical confirmation” (Menninghaus et al., 2019, p. 177). haus et al., 2019, p. 177) that become aesthetic when experienced

This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. But, in fact, only one of the four studies measured changes in the in the context of aesthetic appreciation (e.g., liking a movie be-

This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. states of more than two of the components. As a whole, therefore, cause it is moving). The second class encompasses terms that are they provided only very weak support that being moved meets not emotions per se but can be experienced as emotions during Scherer’s (2005) criteria that define an emotion (see Table 1). aesthetic appraisal. For instance, “by itself, [beauty] designates an aesthetic virtue of the object of feeling; it is only in combination 1. The first of the four studies (Hanich, Wagner, Shah, with the feeling of that it becomes a genuine emotion term” Jacobsen, & Menninghaus, 2014) reported a significant (Menninghaus et al., 2019, p. 176). positive correlation between experienced sadness and enjoyment of viewing film clips, that being moved me- What Is Menninghaus and Colleagues’ (2019) diated the contribution of sadness to enjoyment, and that Evidence for Aesthetic Emotions? people enjoyed being moved. The study, however, provides no evidence that being moved implies the synchro- Did Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) succeed in providing a nized engagement of appraisals, bodily changes, action case for aesthetic emotions as a special class of emotions? We first tendencies, facial and vocal expressions, and subjective examine how well Menninghaus et al. (2019) fared in establishing feelings. Moreover, it cannot show that this emotion was THERE ARE NO AESTHETIC EMOTIONS 643

Table 1 Emotional Components Measured in Four Studies on “Being Moved”

Study Hanich, Wagner, Shah, Menninghaus, Wagner, Wassiliwizky, Koelsch, Wassiliwizky, Wagner, Jacobsen, and Menninghaus Wassiliwizky, Jacobsen, Wagner, Jacobsen, and Jacobsen, and Emotional component (2014) and Knoop (2017) Menninghaus (2017) Menninghaus (2015)

Cognitive — — — — Neurophysiological — — Measured Measured Motivational — — — Measured Expression — — — — Subjective feeling Measured Measured Measured Measured Note. Dashes indicate that the emotional component was not measured in the study.

predictive of aesthetic evaluation, because aesthetic eval- 4. The fourth study (Wassiliwizky et al., 2015) aimed to uation was not measured. What Hanich and colleagues show that chills elicited by sadly and joyfully moving (2014) show, therefore, is that people report having the film clips correlate positively with the intensity of being feeling of being moved when viewing sad and joyful moved and whether being moved mediates the effects of movie clips. sadness and joy on the enjoyment of the clips. The results showed a positive relation between the experience of 2. The second study (Menninghaus et al., 2017) showed that being moved and chills, and that the effects of sadness— participants declare being more moved when listening to but not joy—on enjoyment was mediated by being poems rich in parallelistic features than when listening to moved. But, although the authors use the word enjoy- altered versions that were low in such features. Partici- ment, participants were actually asked to rate their mo- pants also rated the original version higher in liking, tivation to watch the entire movie. This is very different melodiousness, and beauty. In this study, therefore, the to how much they liked or enjoyed the movie. The fact authors show that participants report feeling moved and aesthetic liking often leads to the motivation to repeat liking poems rich in parallelistic features more, but they exposure, does not mean that motivation to repeat expo- do not examine any other emotional component. sure is an indication of aesthetic liking. 3. The third study (Wassiliwizky et al., 2017) included two experiments. In the first one, participants listened to Second, did Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) show that poems they had selected themselves because they were aesthetic emotions differ from nonaesthetic emotions in one or emotionally powerful and might elicit chills or goose- more of the components? They did not. They stated that an bumps. While participants listened to the poems, pilo- appropriate study of genuine aesthetic emotions that derive from erection, electrodermal activity, heart rate, and facial emotion terms used with a nonaesthetic meaning, such as being electromyographic (fEMG) activity were recorded. Par- moved, requires (1) showing that emotional intensity and liking ticipants were asked to press a button for the duration of correlate, (2) evidence that the emotions are predictive of ratings the experienced chills. The results showed that phasic for specific aesthetic virtues, and (3) a contrast of episodes with electrodermal activity was higher during periods of chills and episodes without an aesthetic evaluation dimension. None of or goosebumps than during the neutral periods. Corruga- the studies on being moved, or on any other aesthetic emotion, tor activity was also higher during chills or goosebumps. meet the criteria that Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) specify Less clear effects were found for zygomaticus and car- for the kind of study that is appropriate to contrast aesthetic diovascular activity (see also Forster, Leder, & Ansorge, emotions with everyday emotions (see Table 2). This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. 2016 and Gernot, Pelowski, & Leder, 2018, for other Given the lack of evidence, Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. studies revealing the unclear relation between aesthetic could only speculate about the following emotional components of valuation and fEMG). In the second study, participants aesthetic emotions: listened to two poems in the fMRI. Participants used two buttons to indicate periods of chill duration or neutral 1. Cognitive component: The function of this component is periods. This allowed the authors to identify brain re- the evaluation of objects and events. In Menninghaus and gions whose activity differed during the chill versus colleagues’ (2019) theory, all appraisals that characterize neutral periods. Finally, the authors identified the words emotions in Scherer’s (2005) model are involved in aes- participants were hearing during the chills, finding that thetic emotions (i.e., intrinsic pleasantness, novelty, goal chills tend to cluster toward the end of a poem, the end of relevance, and coping potential). a stanza, or the end of single lines. Thus, the authors studied chills and piloerection, and their neural corre- 2. Neurophysiological component: Menninghaus and col- lates, but they did not ask participants about being leagues (2019) offered no evidence on this point because moved, or about aesthetic appreciation. no study has been designed to examine the physiological 644 SKOV AND NADAL

Table 2 Criteria for the Distinction Between Aesthetic and Everyday Emotions Met by Four Studies on “Being Moved”

Study Hanich et al. Menninghaus et al. Wassiliwizky et al. Wassiliwizky et al. Condition (2014) (2017) (2017) (2015)

Emotion–liking correlation Criteria met Criteria met — Criteria met Emotion predicts aesthetic virtues Criteria met — — — Contrast with and without aesthetic evaluation — — — — Note. Dashes indicate that the criteria were not met in the study.

or neural correlates of aesthetic emotions as conceived by should be reduced to neurobiological facts. The psychological and them. neural levels of analysis coexist in most current psychological theories of emotion, which acknowledge the important explanatory 3. Motivational component: Menninghaus and colleagues role of neural and physiological activity in the genesis and regu- (2019) argued that aesthetic emotions, like other classes lation of emotions (Barrett & Russell, 2015; Scherer, 2005, 2009). of emotions, “entail pronounced and important motiva- This is also true of other theories of aesthetic emotions (Juslin, tional tendencies and actually prime subsequent actions” 2013) and of emotions evoked by music (Eerola et al., 2018; Sachs (p. 184). et al., 2015). If aesthetic emotions denote a distinct phenomenon, this phenomenon must be associated with distinct neurobiological 4. Motor expression component: According to Menning- processes and systems. How does the Menninghaus and colleagues haus and colleagues (2019), aesthetic emotions involve (2019) theory fare with respect to clarifying the nature of these expressions that are common to other classes of emo- processes and systems? tions: smiling, laughter, tears, applause, booing, or words Menninghaus and colleagues’ (2019) proposal lacked a proper of praise or blame. neurobiological description of aesthetic emotions. In fact, their discussion of this fundamental issue is limited to the speculative 5. Subjective feeling component: Aesthetic emotions cover remark that aesthetic emotions should “overlap” with neural sys- the full range of arousal and valence of everyday emo- tems for nonaesthetic counterparts, but also “in addition” recruit tions. The only difference posited by Menninghaus et al. nuclei “associated with” aesthetic evaluation (p. 183). They further (2019) is that aesthetic emotions have a marked positivity noted that this pattern of activity will elicit hedonic liking and or hedonic bias. Negative aesthetic emotions are less modulate various physiological systems, such as heart rate. This diverse than positive aesthetic emotions, and they are vague description of the neurobiological processes constitutive of more easily interrupted and prevented than everyday aesthetic emotion makes it impossible to discern what kind of negative emotions. neural activity would actually count as underpinning an aesthetic In sum, Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) provided only emotion. It is also unclear what the authors mean by their conten- weak evidence that the state of being moved—or any other pur- tion that aesthetic emotions recruit similar networks as “ordinary” ported aesthetic emotion, for that matter—actually is an emotion, emotions but also, “in addition,” networks associated with aes- that is to say, it involves synchronized changes in the cognitive, thetic evaluation. What specifically do they mean by “in addition”? neurophysiological, motivational, expression, or subjective feeling Does the “additional” engagement of aesthetic appreciation pro- components of emotion. More importantly, they also offer no cesses modulate or otherwise influence activity in the “ordinary” evidence that the purported aesthetic emotions differ in any of the emotion networks, or is it the other way around (as suggested by emotion components from nonaesthetic emotions. Even when only their functional claims)?

This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its alliedin publishers. theory, they provide no clue as to what distinguishes aesthetic

This article is intended solely for the personal use offrom the individual user and is not to benonaesthetic disseminated broadly. emotions, except for the positivity bias of aes- Menninghaus et al.’s (2019) Notion of thetic emotions. In short, there is no clear evidence backing Men- Aesthetic Appreciation ninghaus and colleagues’ claim that aesthetic emotions—even the exemplary case of being moved—are actually emotions and that In sum, Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) did not succeed in they differ in any meaningful sense from their nonaesthetic coun- establishing aesthetic emotions as a psychological and neurobio- terparts. logical phenomenon, distinct from other, “ordinary,” emotional states generated by the brain. Menninghaus and colleagues failed The Question of Neurobiological Characterization to show that aesthetic emotions are a distinct emotional category. What, then, drives Menninghaus and colleagues’ belief that aes- The second question a theory of special aesthetic emotions thetic emotions are different? The answer lies in the way Men- should answer concerns their neural underpinnings. Even when ninghaus et al. derived the notion of aesthetic emotions from that such a theory is formulated at a psychological level, it should be in of aesthetic appreciation. accordance with evidence on the neural processes underlying emo- Aesthetic emotions, according to Menninghaus et al. (2019), tion. This is not to imply that psychological theories of emotion exist because humans engage in acts of aesthetic appreciation. THERE ARE NO AESTHETIC EMOTIONS 645

Their theory states that a psychological state becomes an aesthetic haus and colleagues’ (2019) theory, aesthetic emotions are thought emotion if it mediates between the appraisal of a sensory object’s to be special because of a speculative prior, not because empirical aesthetic virtue and how well the object is liked. Thus, the spe- observations of behavior, physiology, or other neurobiological cialness Menninghaus and colleagues imputed to aesthetic emo- processes support such a view. Because the authors believe that tions follows from the specialness they assume characterizes the humans engage in a distinct, aesthetic way of appraising sensory phenomenon of aesthetic appreciation. objects, they assumed that human brains generate “aesthetic” emo- As discussed, Menninghaus et al. (2019) described aesthetic tions. However, the premise that humans appreciate the “intrinsic appreciation as a psychological event where humans appraise pleasantness” of a sensory object by evaluating “a stimulus in itself sensory objects with regard to their “aesthetic virtue.” This idea and independently of the individual’s current needs and goals” is makes aesthetic appreciation a specific form of appraisal. Men- rooted in dated suppositions about the human mind and art, not in ninghaus and colleagues’ underscore how, because it is special, modern explorations of how humans actually perceive, represent, aesthetic appreciation does not reduce to basic evaluation pro- and emotionally respond to sensory objects (Nadal & Skov, 2018; cesses, contrasting their notion of aesthetic appreciation with that Skov, 2019a, 2019b; Skov & Nadal, 2019, in press). We briefly of Berlyne (1971). Berlyne, the authors wrote, “exclusively” as- outline some recent experimental findings that directly contradict cribed aesthetic evaluation to “general psychological mechanisms this view. of emotional activation, arousal, intensity, hedonic value, and motivation,” thus systematically disregarding “the role specific discrete emotions might play in this context” (Menninghaus et al., Empirical Evidence Contradicts the Notion of 2019, p. 172). At the outset of their article, they made clear that it Aesthetic Emotions is precisely this “disregard”—that is, disputing that aesthetic “eval- Despite the appealing speculation that pleasure is experienced uation” of sensory objects contains any special, or nonordinary, differently in aesthetic contexts, including when we enjoy works of components—they seek to rectify. The stated aim of their theory is to reclaim this “additional variance of the process” (Menninghaus art (e.g., Carbon, 2018; Chatterjee & Vartanian, 2016; Christensen, et al., 2019, p. 172). 2017; Makin, 2017), it has proven difficult to identify such dis- But what reason do we have to believe that aesthetic apprecia- tinctive states of aesthetic pleasure (Skov & Nadal, 2018, 2019). tion involves psychological and neurobiological processes that Abundant psychological evidence (e.g., Bloom, 2010) has shown differ from general psychological mechanisms of emotional acti- that the different pleasures humans experience arise from cognitive vation, arousal, intensity, hedonic value, and motivation? As Men- and affective processes that regulate survival-promoting behaviors ninghaus and colleagues (2019) themselves stated, they based this and from beliefs people have about any conceivable source of idea not on scientific knowledge, but on ideas obtained from pleasure, including food, sex, art, design, nature, and so on. Aes- classic philosophy. They specifically referenced Baumgarten and thetic pleasure is no exception. There is no need to invoke aesthetic Kant and embraced their definitions of aesthetic appreciation as a emotions to explain aesthetic pleasure: The general mechanisms of special mental faculty that applies “a special judgmental focus on human cognition and affect are sufficient. Studies that have, for aspects of the objects under consideration that are subjectively instance, compared ratings obtained during beauty evaluations perceived as pleasing to our senses and/or our cognitive capaci- with ratings obtained during liking ratings find that not only are the ties” (Menninghaus et al., 2019, p. 173). It is through this “special two linearly correlated, but also they load onto a common factor, judgmental focus” that people evaluate a sensory object’s “aes- what Berlyne (1974) called a common hedonic tone (Skov, Varta- thetic virtue” (Menninghaus et al., 2019, p. 173). However, what nian, Sun, Che, & Nadal, 2019). Furthermore, as recently shown by the term aesthetic virtue means is less clear, as it is not defined by Brielmann and Pelli (2019), people who score high on an anhedonia the authors. Menninghaus and colleagues (2019) described aes- scale lack the ability to experience beauty, suggesting that beauty thetic appreciation as evaluating “in a largely intuitive way, phe- ratings are rooted in basic states of hedonic pleasure. nomena that by definition partially defy a strictly conceptual There is also scarce evidence supporting one of the central derivation—namely, the aesthetic virtues of individual objects or claims inherent to Menninghaus and colleagues’ (2019) definition performances in all their richness and individuality” (p. 173). They of aesthetic appreciation; that is, aesthetic appreciation designates noted that one of the preeminent examples of an aesthetic appraisal appraisal events that evaluate a stimulus “in itself and indepen- This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. is the evaluation of objects’ intrinsic pleasure: “appraisals of dently of the individual’s current needs and goals” (p. 178). This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. intrinsic pleasantness are an individual’s evaluation of a stimulus Rather, experiments overwhelmingly find that sensory valuation is in itself and independently of the individual’s current needs and modulated by regulatory needs and behavioral goals and motivates goals” (Menninghaus et al., 2019, p. 178). Together, these state- decision making (Becker et al., 2019; Berridge & Kringelbach, ments suggest that Menninghaus et al. took aesthetic virtues to 2015; Skov, 2019b; Skov & Nadal, 2019). This fact also applies to mean something like sensory object properties as they are subjec- stimulus categories traditionally thought of as “aesthetic,” such as tively assessed for their quality in themselves. This form of ap- visual art and music. For example, both music and paintings have praisal presumably stands in contrast to other types of evaluations been found to engage nuclei in the ventral striatum, a key location where a stimulus is scrutinized with respect to pragmatic concerns. for reward prediction neurons (Bartra, McGuire, & Kable, 2013; Nowhere in their article is this particular view of aesthetic Brown, Gao, Tisdelle, Eickhoff, & Liotti, 2011; Sescousse, Caldú, appreciation defended or justified with theoretical arguments or Segura, & Dreher, 2013), with several studies directly implicating empirical evidence. It is simply assumed to be true. It serves as an nucleus accumbens activity in predictions of how rewarding a axiom that provides the whole edifice for their theory of aesthetic piece of music will be (Gold et al., 2019; Salimpoor, Benovoy, emotions but is itself considered self-evident. Thus, in Menning- Larcher, Dagher, & Zatorre, 2011, 2013). 646 SKOV AND NADAL

Finally, abundant empirical research on how the brains of hu- tional systems other than the pleasure system is necessary for mans and other animals compute hedonic liking for sensory ob- sensory experiences to be imbued with pleasure or displeasure. jects shows that liking arises when neurons in the mesocortico- Together, evidence from psychological and neuroscientific stud- limbic reward circuit are activated (Becker et al., 2019; Berridge & ies suggests that it is quite possible to understand appreciation Kringelbach, 2015; Wallis, 2019). Thus, experiments find that events as the result of a neurobiological system common to dif- nuclei distributed across the striatum, ventromedial prefrontal cor- ferent types of appraisal, rooted in the generation of “ordinary” tex, insula, and amygdala, amplify or decrease how pleasurable or pleasure and displeasure. There is, therefore, no good argument for displeasurable a sensory stimulus is experienced to be (Bartra et believing that the human brain employs a special system for al., 2013; Berridge, 2019; Brown et al., 2011; Sescousse et al., aesthetic appreciation or appraisal that is different in terms of 2013), determining behavioral liking or disliking. In humans, function or physiological processing. Consequently, nothing about functional neuroimaging and tractography studies have found that our current understanding of the human brain suggests it has subjects that have a diminished axonal capacity for relaying infor- evolved distinct emotional processes that are engaged during such mation from a given perceptual system to these nuclei exhibit a appreciation events. Rather, available evidence suggests that the reduced, or even nullified, ability to produce a hedonic response opposite view is more likely: that the ability of humans to attend for stimuli represented by the perceptual system in question (Loui to almost every aspect of the physical world, including the parts of et al., 2017; Martínez-Molina, Mas-Herrero, Rodríguez-Fornells, it constructed by humans, and assess them for their pleasing Zatorre, & Marco-Pallarés, 2016, 2019; Sachs, Ellis, Schlaug, & Loui, qualities, relies on an engagement of affective processes that are 2016). shared with other forms of appraisal. A central finding to emerge from this body of work is that value signals in the reward circuit do not appear to distinguish between Conclusion types of appraisal, sensory modality, or the kind of object being evaluated (Bartra et al., 2013; Brown et al., 2011; Sescousse et al., Psychology has a long tradition of thinking about aesthetic 2013). Neural activity associated with hedonic appreciation over- emotions. Some psychologists believe that aesthetic emotions con- laps, whether subjects appraise how food tastes, if faces are at- stitute a distinct class that can be distinguished from other emotions. Aesthetic emotions have even been cited as one of the traits tractive, or indeed if music or visual art are to their liking. Fur- that distinguish human psychology from that of other animals thermore, neurobiological processes underlying the reward circuit (Ayala, 2017; Dobzhansky, 1962, p. 214). seem conserved both across species and across functions. For It has been difficult, though, to find empirical support for the example, ␮-opioids—key neurotransmitters involved in regulating notion that such aesthetic emotions actually exist. More than 100 pleasure—in the nucleus accumbens, pallidum, and orbitofrontal years after the first attempts to define aesthetic emotions (Bain, cortex, modulate the pleasure experienced for chemical tastants in 1883; Ribot, 1897; Sully, 1892), there is still no well-described, animals (Peciña, Smith, & Berridge, 2006) and humans (Katsuura, commonly accepted, theory of what a distinct aesthetic emotion Heckmann, & Taha, 2011) and even modulate pleasure for human might be. Specifically, there is no strong account of what sets such facial beauty (Chelnokova et al., 2014) and music (Mallik, putative aesthetic emotions apart from other emotions studied by Chanda, & Levitin, 2017). Likewise, many of the factors that psychology: what characterizes them in terms of behavior, func- influence how value signals in the reward circuit operate during tion, or physiology. appreciation events appear to be conserved over evolutionary time, The theory proposed by Menninghaus and colleagues (2019), and to affect both the appreciation of primary reinforcers and unfortunately, does not change this state of affairs. As our com- cultural objects. A good example of this is the framing effect mentary demonstrates, Menninghaus et al.’s definition was mainly (Okamoto & Dan, 2013) that has been observed in different motivated by a speculative conception of human engagement in primate taxa (Lakshminarayanan & Santos, 2012; Santos & Rosati, the aesthetic appreciation of sensory objects. This conception is 2015) and modulates hedonic valuation for both food (McClure et not grounded on strong and clear experimental evidence, rendering al., 2004; Plassmann, O’Doherty, Shiv, & Rangel, 2008) and their claim for the existence of specialized emotional states asso- visual art (Kirk, Skov, Hulme, Christensen, & Zeki, 2009)in ciated with aesthetic appreciation just as speculative. In contrast, humans. The most parsimonious interpretation of this voluminous empirical evidence from studies investigating how sensory infor- This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. body of work is that the human brain uses a common system to mation becomes imbued with hedonic values strongly suggests that This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. assess liking for sensory objects, one rooted in the general mam- liking evaluations engage common affective processes, whether the malian affective response of pleasure and displeasure. object being evaluated is a steak, the face of a conspecific, a roaring There is, therefore, at this point, no compelling reason to believe waterfall, or a performance by Marina Abramovic´. Not only is there that aesthetic appreciation in the Menninghaus and et al. (2019) a lack of compelling evidence that aesthetic emotions exist, but also sense—“a special judgmental focus on aspects of the objects under there is convincing evidence that they do not exist—at least in the consideration that are subjectively perceived as pleasing to our sense of a special, distinct class of human emotions. senses and/or our cognitive capacities” (p. 173)—should use func- The idea of aesthetic emotion is as empty and arbitrary as the tional mechanisms that go beyond this basic system (see also idea, for instance, of aesthetic memory. Aesthetic appreciation Nadal & Skov, 2018; Skov, 2019a, 2019b; Skov & Nadal, 2019, in involves memory: Familiarity, past experiences, expertise, and press). Certainly, to the best of our knowledge, no experiment so autobiographical memories shape how much we like something or far has found that Menninghaus and colleagues “additional vari- someone. But that does not mean that it makes sense to distinguish ance” of emotional processing is a prerequisite for aesthetic ap- aesthetic memory processes from nonaesthetic memory processes. preciation events to occur. Nothing suggests that activity in emo- The fact that memories are a constitutive aspect of aesthetic appreci- THERE ARE NO AESTHETIC EMOTIONS 647

ation and that they are even predictive of liking, is not reason enough Carbon, C.-C. (2019). Empirical approaches to studying art experience. to postulate a special class of aesthetic memory processes. Without Journal of Perceptual Imaging. Advance online publication. http://dx evidence that in the context of aesthetic appreciation memory shows .doi.org/10.2352/J.Percept.Imaging.2019.2.1.010501 distinctive psychological and neurobiological features, it is prudent to Chatterjee, A. (2013). The aesthetic brain: How we evolved to desire abandon the notion of a special class of aesthetic memory. Likewise, beauty and enjoy art. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. http:// without evidence that in the context of aesthetic appreciation emotion dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199811809.001.0001 Chatterjee, A. (2014). Scientific aesthetics: Three steps forward. 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