RPF 2016/17: Studying the Interaction between Aesthetic Judgement and Emotional Processing of Contemporary Music using an Audience Response System

Musicologists, practitioners, and critics have recognized that contemporary music is often challenging to audiences used to traditional western music structures. However, this music can be enjoyable. We will conduct a pilot study in order to understand why some listeners respond positively and others negatively to this music, identifying the cognitive and emotional processes that facilitate those responses in concerts. Therefore, we intend to purchase an audience response system that facilitates the collection of continuous psychological and physiological markers of experience from an entire audience. This will lay the foundations for and add credibility to an AHRC application. It will also enable other researchers in the University to study audience responses.