Ratings of the extent to which specific emotions can be expressed in music.
| Kreutz (2000) | Lindstrom et al. (2003) | Juslin and Laukka (2004) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Subjects | 50 students | 135 expert musicians | 141 volunteers |
| Number of emotions | 32 | 38 | 38 |
| Kreutz (2000) | Lindstrom et al. (2003) | Juslin and Laukka (2004) | |
| 1. | Happiness | Joy | Joy |
| 2. | Sadness | Sadness | Sadness |
| 3. | Desire | Anxiety | Love |
| 4. | Pain | Love | Calm |
| 5. | Unrest | Calm | Anger |
| 6. | Anger | Tension | Tenderness |
| 7. | Love | Humor | Longing |
| 8. | Loneliness | Pain | Solemnity |
| 9. | Fear | Tenderness | Anxiety |
| 10. | Despaire | Anger | Hate |
This passage is adapted from Patrik N. Juslin, “What does music express? Basic emotions and beyond.” © 2007-2014, Frontiers Media SA.
Few scholars would dispute that music is often heard as
expressive of emotions by listeners. Indeed, emotional
expression has been regarded as one of the most important
criteria for the aesthetic value of music (Juslin, 2013). Music
has even been described as a “language of the emotions” by
some authors (Cooke, 1959). It is not surprising, then, that a
number of studies have investigated whether music can reliably
convey emotions to listeners, and—if so—what musical
features may carry this information.
Note that there are different senses in which music can be
said to express emotions. Firstly, a listener could perceive any
emotion in a piece of music; and in a nontrivial sense, it would
be inappropriate to claim that the listener is “wrong.” The
subjective impression of an individual listener cannot be
disputed on objective grounds. A first way to index emotional
expression is thus to accept the unique impressions of
individual listeners: Whatever a listener perceives in the music
is what the music is expressing—for him or her at least! This is
the view adopted by MacDonald et al. (2012).
Several researchers prefer a more “restrictive” view on
expression, however, which holds that music is expressive of a
specific emotion only to the extent that there is some minimum
level of agreement among different listeners regarding the
expression, presumably because there is something in the
music that produces a similar impression in many listeners.
Expression thus conceived brings a stronger focus on
psychophysical relationships between musical features and
perceptual impressions. Thus, a second way to index emotional
expression in music is to focus on listener agreement
(Campbell, 1942).
The notion of expression does not require that there is any
correspondence between what the listener perceives in a piece
of music and what the composer or performer intends to
express. In contrast, the concept of “communication” requires
that there is both an intention to express a specific emotion and
recognition of this emotion by listeners. Presumably, many
musicians care about whether listeners perceive their music the
way they intended it. Hence, if we study expressed emotions in
terms of communication, we might also index emotional
expression in terms of accuracy (Juslin and Timmers, 2010;
see, e.g., Thompson and Robitaille, 1992).
Most likely, there are fewer emotions for which there is
agreement among several listeners than there are emotions that
a single listener may perceive in a piece. Even fewer emotions
may be relevant if we consider those emotions that might be
reliably communicated from a musician to a listener; that is,
where there is an intention to convey an emotional character,
which is correctly recognized by a perceiver.
Just as there are many different ways to conceptualize
expression in music, there are different approaches that may be
adopted to investigate empirically which emotions music can
express. One rather simple way to approach the question is to
ask music listeners directly. Thus, the table shows data from
three different studies in which listeners were asked which
emotions music can express. In each study, the subject could
choose from a long list of emotion labels. Shown are the rank
orders with which each of the top ten emotion terms was
selected. As can be seen, happiness, sadness, anger, fear and
love, tenderness were all among the top-ten emotions, and this
tendency was similar across the three data sets, despite
differences in samples (musicians vs. students, various
countries) and selections of emotion terms (ranging from 32 to
38 terms). Hence, there seems to be agreement about which
emotions are easiest to express in music.
Few scholars would dispute that music is often heard as
expressive of emotions by listeners. Indeed, emotional
expression has been regarded as one of the most important
criteria for the aesthetic value of music (Juslin, 2013). Music
has even been described as a “language of the emotions” by
some authors (Cooke, 1959). It is not surprising, then, that a
number of studies have investigated whether music can reliably
convey emotions to listeners, and—if so—what musical
features may carry this information.
Note that there are different senses in which music can be
said to express emotions. Firstly, a listener could perceive any
emotion in a piece of music; and in a nontrivial sense, it would
be inappropriate to claim that the listener is “wrong.” The
subjective impression of an individual listener cannot be
disputed on objective grounds. A first way to index emotional
expression is thus to accept the unique impressions of
individual listeners: Whatever a listener perceives in the music
is what the music is expressing—for him or her at least! This is
the view adopted by MacDonald et al. (2012).
Several researchers prefer a more “restrictive” view on
expression, however, which holds that music is expressive of a
specific emotion only to the extent that there is some minimum
level of agreement among different listeners regarding the
expression, presumably because there is something in the
music that produces a similar impression in many listeners.
Expression thus conceived brings a stronger focus on
psychophysical relationships between musical features and
perceptual impressions. Thus, a second way to index emotional
expression in music is to focus on listener agreement
(Campbell, 1942).
The notion of expression does not require that there is any
correspondence between what the listener perceives in a piece
of music and what the composer or performer intends to
express. In contrast, the concept of “communication” requires
that there is both an intention to express a specific emotion and
recognition of this emotion by listeners. Presumably, many
musicians care about whether listeners perceive their music the
way they intended it. Hence, if we study expressed emotions in
terms of communication, we might also index emotional
expression in terms of accuracy (Juslin and Timmers, 2010;
see, e.g., Thompson and Robitaille, 1992).
Most likely, there are fewer emotions for which there is
agreement among several listeners than there are emotions that
a single listener may perceive in a piece. Even fewer emotions
may be relevant if we consider those emotions that might be
reliably communicated from a musician to a listener; that is,
where there is an intention to convey an emotional character,
which is correctly recognized by a perceiver.
Just as there are many different ways to conceptualize
expression in music, there are different approaches that may be
adopted to investigate empirically which emotions music can
express. One rather simple way to approach the question is to
ask music listeners directly. Thus, the table shows data from
three different studies in which listeners were asked which
emotions music can express. In each study, the subject could
choose from a long list of emotion labels. Shown are the rank
orders with which each of the top ten emotion terms was
selected. As can be seen, happiness, sadness, anger, fear and
love, tenderness were all among the top-ten emotions, and this
tendency was similar across the three data sets, despite
differences in samples (musicians vs. students, various
countries) and selections of emotion terms (ranging from 32 to
38 terms). Hence, there seems to be agreement about which
emotions are easiest to express in music.