Multiple Mechanism (music and emotion)

Music and Emotion (from Juslin & Västfjäll) and Juslin's 2013 update)

"Because music does not seem to have goal implications, some researchers have assumed that music cannot induce emotions at all ... or, at least, that it cannot induce basic emotions related to survival functions".

They reject this idea, and propose that some of the problems in existing research on the subject is the result of experiments that do not account for the mechanisms that underlay emotional response to music:

"We believe that the solution to this problem is a more hypothesis-driven approach that takes the characteristics of each mechanism into account. Such an approach is proposed in this article."

They propose an operational approach to the question of emotions induced by music (which they differentiate from listeners perceiving emotional expression in music).

They identify 6 components to emotional responses and ask can these be identified in relation to musical experiences:

cognitive appraisal (e.g., you appraise the situation as “dangerous”)
subjective feeling (e.g., you feel afraid)
physiological arousal (e.g., your heart starts to beat faster)
expression (e.g., you scream),
action tendency (e.g., you run away)
regulation (e.g., you try to calm yourself)

One of the questions raised is the notion of everyday emotions and aesthetic emotions. Juslin notes that only music evokes emotions in listeners only 55-65% of the times. The emotions evoked are quite varied and can also be mixed (both joy and sadness). He suggests that aesthetic emotions may not be different in kind but are the result of different causes.

They quote various studies that demonstrated most of the above components, but:

"However, there is one emotion component for which evidence is lacking – the cognitive appraisal. This raises the primary question of how, exactly, musical emotions are induced" where "Cognitive appraisal refers to a process whereby an emotion is evoked in a person because an event is interpreted as having important implications for the person’s goals [...]. The problem is that music as such rarely has implications for life goals."

To answer that question they propose several mechanisms that link music to emotion. They note that these different mechanisms are likely to operate in parallel. These mechanisms are general to the emotional system and can operate independently of the evaluation that music, as a stimuli, does not have real life implications.

Brain stem reflex. These rely on the early stages of auditory processing to quickly divert attentional resources to important events e.g. loud noise.

Rhythmic entrainment. Strong pulsed element in the music is internalised (e.g. heart rate or breathing) which leads to emotional response: arousal but also emotional bonding in social situation (techno music).

Evaluative conditioning. Some music becomes associated with an emotion through simultaneous exposure. (The idea of conditioned emotion can be traced back to this historic study). [note the comments by Bezdek & Gerrig about the role of memory and learning in film music:

"The film [Jaws] provides viewers with an opportunity to associate a particular piece of music – a repetition of two notes in an ascending pattern – with the narrative arrival of the Great White Shark. This pairing isn’t accidental" (emphasis added)

Emotional contagion. Listeners become aware of an emotion depicted or echoed by the music and this realisation induces said emotions indirectly (relating to empathy we have with other people).

Visual imagery. Listeners evoke mental images (shapes, movement, landscape, etc.) which then give rise to emotional reaction.

Episodic memory. A piece of music is associated with a personal memory and brings up the emotional response of that memory.

Musical expectancy. See Meyer.

Much of the update article is devoted to discussing how aesthetics can fit into this module.

Aesthetic Emotion. More informed by cultural elements of aesthetic criteria - including domain specific knowledge - therefore, this will vary more over time and place. Aesthetic criteria (beauty, skill, novelty, etc.) are used to arrive at an aesthetic evaluation. Above a certain threshold this judgment leads to an emotional response.

Both the comments of Bharucha & Curtis and Agustino, Preyer, & Meck highlight the relationship of music to motion suggesting this is also a link between music and emotion.
Several commentators look at this from an evolutionary perspective since we believe emotions (regulating emotions, communicating emotions) are an important aspect of our species' behaviour and success.
Konecni is highly critical. In particular he points out that in most of the mechanisms described the direct cause of emotion is not music at all. He goes on the summarise an alternative view pointing to his articles on the topic.
Krumhansl & Agres focus on expectancy, briefly summarising Meyer's main ideas and pointing to several studies that validate those. Their main point is that this mechanism gives rise to tension/relaxation patterns which is an emotional response but not of the happy/sad type.
Madison's comments argues for more music-specific focus, noting that '"none of the 66 hypotheses listed in J&V’s Table 4 include music-speciﬁc variables". He also points out that while research suggests almost all emotional responses to music are positive the various mechanisms that the article outlines would give rise to both positive and negative emotions.

This article (Hanich et at, Why We Like to Watch Sad Films. The Pleasure of Being Moved in Aesthetic Experiences, Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, & the Arts. 8(2):130-143, May 2014) reports on an interesting study about sad emotions in film and suggest why watching those might still be a positive experience.