Composers convey emotion through music by co-varying structural cues. Although the complex interplay provides a rich listening experience, this creates challenges for understanding the contributions of individual cues. Here we investigate how three specific cues (attack rate, mode, and pitch height) work together to convey emotion in Bach9s Well Tempered-Clavier (WTC). In three experiments, we explore responses to (1) eight-measure excerpts and (2) musically “resolved” excerpts, and (3) investigate the role of different standard dimensional scales of emotion. In each experiment, thirty nonmusician participants rated perceived emotion along scales of valence and intensity (Experiments 1 & 2) or valence and arousal (Experiment 3) for 48 pieces in the WTC. Responses indicate listeners used attack rate, Mode, and pitch height to make judgements of valence, but only attack rate for intensity/arousal. Commonality analyses revealed mode predicted the most variance for valence ratings, followed by attack rate, with pitch height contributing minimally. In Experiment 2 mode increased in predictive power compared to Experiment 1. For Experiment 3, using “arousal” instead of “intensity” showed similar results to Experiment 1. We discuss how these results complement and extend previous findings of studies with tightly controlled stimuli, providing additional perspective on complex issues of interpersonal communication.

中文翻译：

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情感表达

作曲家通过改变结构线索通过音乐传达情感。尽管复杂的交互作用提供了丰富的聆听体验，但这为理解单个提示的作用带来了挑战。在这里，我们研究了三种特定的线索（攻击率，模式和音高）如何共同发挥作用，以传达Bach9s的脾气十足（WTC）情绪。在三个实验中，我们探索了对（1）八小节节录和（2）在音乐上“解决”的节录的响应，以及（3）研究了不同标准情感尺度的作用。在每个实验中，三十名非音乐人参与者在WTC中按照价位和强度（实验1和2）或价位和唤醒（实验3）的等级对感知的情绪进行了评分。响应指示侦听器使用的攻击率，模式，和音高来判断化合价，但仅针对强度/唤醒率。通用性分析显示，模式预测价数变化最大，其次是攻击率，音高高度贡献最小。与实验1相比，在实验2模式下预测能力提高了。对于实验3，使用“刺激”而不是“强度”显示的结果与实验1相似。我们讨论了这些结果如何补充和扩展先前严格控制刺激的研究结果，提供有关人际沟通的复杂问题的其他观点。