Sonic emotion: variability of perception based on context and state

Abstract

The study explored the momentary emotional disposition of 71 subjects (average age 23.2 years) by exposing them to six songs from different eras. Participants were asked to describe the emotions or feelings evoked by each song immediately after listening. This process was repeated after a 4-month interval, using the same songs in the same order to assess changes in emotional perception. Results indicated that in more than half of the cases, subjects provided different responses in the two stages of the study. This phenomenon suggests that emotional reactions to the respective songs were significantly influenced by the subjects' mood at the time of listening.