Can science account for taste? Psychological insights into art appreciation

Abstract

The popular notion that “there's no accounting for taste” reflects a widely held belief that aesthetic preferences are inherently unpredictable. Yet a growing body of research suggests that subjective art appreciation is amenable to objective scientific investigation. This paper reviews the state of the art in the science of art research, examining the extent to which psychological research can account for art appreciation. Taking a two-pronged approach, we first examine how bottom-up variables intrinsic to paintings, including abstraction, form, complexity, and symmetry, reliably influence art appreciation. As the beauty of an artwork can only be appreciated by a beholder, we then examine how top-down influences, such as artwork novelty and viewer expertise, affect the understanding of, and preferences for, paintings. Though the notion that one could ever “fully” explain or predict an aesthetic preference may appear implausibly reductionist, this review demonstrates that scientific methods have shed significant light on a variety of factors that reliably influence art appreciation, paving the way to a greater understanding of the psychology underlying visual art.

Keywords:

• Aesthetics
• Laterality
• Painting
• Perception
• Viewer

Acknowledgements

Thanks are extended to Janet van Hell, Rolf Reber, and three anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful suggestions and helpful advice on an earlier version of this paper.

Notes

¹Though colour undoubtedly plays an important role in art appreciation, colour research has not been included in the present review, as a detailed analysis of the distinct history of colour research is beyond the scope of the present paper.

²We thank Rolf Reber for this suggestion.