Aesthetic Attitude and Variations in Reported Experience of a Painting

Empirical-phenomenological methods were used to assess effects of aesthetic attitude on variations in aesthetic response. Immediately before viewing a painting, thirty participants were randomly assigned to conditions in which they either attempted to physically relax or attempted to physically relax andpsychically distance themselves from practical concerns. Then, participants: 1) provided verbal accounts of their experiences during three one-minute viewings of Raphael's La Fornaria, 2) completed a version of Gardner's painting style identification task [1], and 3) rated the target painting, the experimental procedures, and their background in art. Numerically aided phenomenological methods [2] revealed five distinct types of reported experience: tentative psychological interpretation, stereotyped rejection, quiet encounter, impatient overfamiliarity, and positive painterly evaluation. Analyses of the style identification data and of participants' ratings provided convergent validation for these types of aesthetic response. Although the manipulation of aesthetic attitude was not optimal, numerical phenomenological methods allowed assessment of subtly differentiated types of aesthetic response. These types of reported experience argue against a rigid dichotomy between aesthetic and nonaesthetic responses.