Abstract
Music performances often consist of both auditory and visual information, yet the role of the visual information can be overlooked. It is argued that the visual aspects of music performance can positively or negatively affect various aspects of the musical performance. The present study looks at the relationship of the performer’s facial expressions and the listener’s perception of emotion. Two songs were selected as stimuli, one “happy” and one “sad” and we created audiovisual recordings of each song. Using congruent and incongruent audio-visual conditions, it was hypothesized that the video would strengthen emotion perception in the congruent conditions while weakening emotion perception in the incongruent conditions. We found that the presentation of happy visuals significantly increased ratings of happiness regardless of the music. These findings support the idea that visual information plays a role in perception of emotion in music.
Advisor
Neuhoff, John
Department
Psychology
Recommended Citation
Castle, Rachel, "The Effects of Performers' Facial Expressions on Emotion Perception in Music" (2017). Senior Independent Study Theses. Paper 7663.
https://openworks.wooster.edu/independentstudy/7663
Disciplines
Cognition and Perception
Keywords
music, emotion, facial expression, audio-visual integration
Publication Date
2017
Degree Granted
Bachelor of Arts
Document Type
Senior Independent Study Thesis
© Copyright 2017 Rachel Castle