Crossmodal transfer of emotions from music to facial expression judgement

Abstract

Music has the power to elicit emotions onto its listeners, with emotional music pieces affecting the mood of an individual, with examples of people smiling or tearing from listening to a music piece. On the other hand, facial expression judgement is shown to be influenced by many factors, such as the stimulus that is exposed before. There has been limited research on how music may affect facial expression judgements in individuals and it is unclear if an adaptation aftereffect or a priming effect will be present. The study seeks to explore the crossmodal transfer of emotions from music to facial expression judgement by using happy and sad music stimuli as the adaptor. The results presented supporting evidence that music is able to evoke emotions and influence judgements. Exposure to a music excerpt, as short as four seconds long, is able to influence the facial expression judgement. The results showed that happy music played prior will cause the neutral face to appear happier, suggesting a crossmodal priming effect. This study sheds light upon crossmodal transfer of emotions between the auditory and visual domain.