Many investigations on the emotional responses to music focus on the use of music pieces that contain a plethora of characteristics. This multitude of characteristics hampers the detection of the specific acoustic properties that contribute to the evoked emotions. In the present study, we were interested in the potential contribution of specific acoustical parameters of consonance to induced emotions. We, therefore, manipulated consonance by creating auditory stimuli that lacked the complexity of music by being very well defined in terms of their musical and acoustical characteristics. Specifically, Stimulus Set A was manipulated as a function of musical interval and harmonicity, with frequency components that followed and did not follow the harmonic series, and musical intervals that were consonant or dissonant, while Stimulus Set C was based on a previously utilized consonance manipulation in musical pieces. A duration manipulation was also included given the changes that might occur as a stimulus unfolds in time. Using pleasantness ratings, we found that consonant musical intervals—usually perceived as pleasant—were rated as unpleasant when the component tones contained inharmonic frequencies, while dissonant intervals remained unaffected by harmonicity. These results demonstrate, for the first time, that acoustical and psychoacoustical manipulations of consonance interact and contribute to listeners’ pleasantness ratings. Α trend was observed for the duration with stimuli becoming more unpleasant as their duration increased. Subsequent qualitative comparison of our stimulus manipulation with musical excerpts showed that our stimuli were, in general, judged as less pleasant and that consonant musical excerpts were judged as more pleasant as duration increased, thus potentially pointing to the role of music completion.

许多关于对音乐的情绪反应的研究都集中在使用包含过多特征的音乐作品上。这众多的特征阻碍了对诱发情绪的特定声学特性的检测。在本研究中，我们感兴趣的是特定声学参数对诱发情绪的潜在贡献。因此，我们通过创建缺乏音乐复杂性的听觉刺激来操纵和​​声，因为它们的音乐和声学特征得到了很好的定义。具体来说，刺激集 A 被操纵为音程和谐波的函数，频率分量跟随和不跟随谐波序列，以及辅音或不和谐的音程，而 Stimulus Set C 则基于先前在音乐作品中使用的协和操作。考虑到刺激及时展开时可能发生的变化，还包括持续时间操纵。使用愉悦度评级，我们发现当分量音调包含不和谐的频率时，通常被认为令人愉悦的辅音音程被评为不愉快，而不和谐的音程则不受谐波的影响。这些结果首次表明，对和声的声学和心理声学操纵相互作用并有助于听众的愉悦度评级。在持续时间中观察到A趋势，刺激随着持续时间的增加而变得更加不愉快。随后对我们的刺激操作与音乐节选的定性比较表明，我们的刺激通常是