-
Trends in Cognitive Sciences Feb 2015Music has always played a central role in human culture. The question of how musical sounds can have such profound emotional and rewarding effects has been a topic of... (Review)
Review
Music has always played a central role in human culture. The question of how musical sounds can have such profound emotional and rewarding effects has been a topic of interest throughout generations. At a fundamental level, listening to music involves tracking a series of sound events over time. Because humans are experts in pattern recognition, temporal predictions are constantly generated, creating a sense of anticipation. We summarize how complex cognitive abilities and cortical processes integrate with fundamental subcortical reward and motivation systems in the brain to give rise to musical pleasure. This work builds on previous theoretical models that emphasize the role of prediction in music appreciation by integrating these ideas with recent neuroscientific evidence.
Topics: Anticipation, Psychological; Auditory Perception; Brain; Dopamine; Humans; Music; Pleasure; Reward
PubMed: 25534332
DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2014.12.001 -
Emotion (Washington, D.C.) Aug 2023The aim of this article is to examine how affect changes when people are pursuing performance goals. We do this using the circumplex model of affect, in which a person's...
The aim of this article is to examine how affect changes when people are pursuing performance goals. We do this using the circumplex model of affect, in which a person's current affective state is represented as a point on a plane defined by the latent dimensions of pleasure and activation. We test competing hypotheses regarding the direction of changes within this 2-dimensional space. The first set of hypotheses are derived from Carver and Scheier's (1998) theory of self-regulation, which predicts that changes in the prospects of goal attainment should produce changes along axes offset 45° from the pleasure and activation dimensions. The second set of hypotheses are derived from the concept of core affect (Russell, 2003), which predicts that changes in the prospects of goal attainment should produce changes in pleasure, while changes in task demands should produce changes in activation. Two studies are reported in which participants provided ratings of momentary affect during goal pursuit. We developed a latent change model to estimate the direction and magnitude of changes in affect attributable to changes in the prospects of goal attainment and task demand. The results are more consistent with the hypotheses derived from the core affect account than with the hypotheses derived from the Carver and Scheier account. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed, with a focus on prospects for the development of an integrative theory, which accounts for both the motivational and affective components of goal pursuit. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).
Topics: Humans; Goals; Motivation; Achievement; Pleasure; Social Perception
PubMed: 36107654
DOI: 10.1037/emo0001164 -
PloS One 2024Groove, or the pleasurable urge to move to music, offers unique insight into the relationship between emotion and action. The predictive coding of music model posits...
Groove, or the pleasurable urge to move to music, offers unique insight into the relationship between emotion and action. The predictive coding of music model posits that groove is linked to predictions of music formed over time, with stimuli of moderate complexity rated as most pleasurable and likely to engender movement. At the same time, listeners vary in the pleasure they derive from music listening: individuals with musical anhedonia report reduced pleasure during music listening despite no impairments in music perception and no general anhedonia. Little is known about musical anhedonics' subjective experience of groove. Here we examined the relationship between groove and music reward sensitivity. Participants (n = 287) heard drum-breaks that varied in perceived complexity, and rated each for pleasure and wanting to move. Musical anhedonics (n = 13) had significantly lower ratings compared to controls (n = 13) matched on music perception abilities and general anhedonia. However, both groups demonstrated the classic inverted-U relationship between ratings of pleasure & move and stimulus complexity, with ratings peaking for intermediately complex stimuli. Across our entire sample, pleasure ratings were most strongly related with music reward sensitivity for highly complex stimuli (i.e., there was an interaction between music reward sensitivity and stimulus complexity). Finally, the sensorimotor subscale of music reward was uniquely associated with move, but not pleasure, ratings above and beyond the five other dimensions of musical reward. Results highlight the multidimensional nature of reward sensitivity and suggest that pleasure and wanting to move are driven by overlapping but separable mechanisms.
Topics: Humans; Music; Anhedonia; Female; Male; Adult; Pleasure; Reward; Young Adult; Auditory Perception; Emotions; Adolescent; Acoustic Stimulation
PubMed: 38652721
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0301478 -
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews Apr 2016Animal research has shown it is possible to want a reward that is not liked once obtained. Although these findings have elicited interest, human experiments have... (Review)
Review
Animal research has shown it is possible to want a reward that is not liked once obtained. Although these findings have elicited interest, human experiments have produced contradictory results, raising doubts about the existence of separate wanting and liking influences in human reward processing. This discrepancy could be due to inconsistences in the operationalization of these concepts. We systematically reviewed the methodologies used to assess human wanting and/or liking and found that most studies operationalized these concepts in congruency with the animal literature. Nonetheless, numerous studies operationalized wanting in similar ways to those that operationalized liking. These contradictions might be driven by a major source of confound: expected pleasantness. Expected pleasantness underlies cognitive desires and does not correspond to animal liking, a hedonic experience, or to animal wanting, which relies on affective relevance, consisting of the perception of a cue associated with a relevant reward for the organism's current physiological state. Extending the concept of affective relevance and differentiating it from expected pleasantness might improve measures of human wanting and liking.
Topics: Affect; Animals; Appetitive Behavior; Brain; Humans; Motivation; Pleasure; Reward
PubMed: 26851575
DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2016.01.006 -
Psychological Reports Aug 2023This paper describes the evaluation of the Happiness through Goal-Setting Training, a multiple intervention approach which helps participants to reflect on, and modify...
This paper describes the evaluation of the Happiness through Goal-Setting Training, a multiple intervention approach which helps participants to reflect on, and modify their reasons for goal pursuit. The training is theoretically grounded in the goal-striving reasons framework. This framework captures four important reasons for goal pursuit and has received a substantial amount of empirical support for its predictive power in relation to positive psychological functioning. The four goal-striving reasons are the pursuit of goals out of pleasure, altruism, fear of self-esteem loss or necessity. The evaluation of the training, employing a before-and-after study design, is based on two data sets comprising data from a face-to-face delivery of the training ( 41) and an online delivery of the training ( 40). Overall, the findings from both studies, using paired sample t-tests, show that the Happiness through Goal-Setting Training significantly improves the quality of people's reasons for goal pursuit as well as their positive psychological functioning measured through life satisfaction, positive affect, negative affect and work-engagement. Thus, the Happiness through Goal-Setting Training complements the existing suite of well-being interventions by providing a happiness training that focusses specifically on improving people's reasons for goal-pursuit.
Topics: Humans; Happiness; Goals; Pleasure; Motivation; Self Concept
PubMed: 35084260
DOI: 10.1177/00332941211071007 -
The Journal of Neuroscience : the... Nov 2019Music ranks among the greatest human pleasures. It consistently engages the reward system, and converging evidence implies it exploits predictions to do so. Both...
Music ranks among the greatest human pleasures. It consistently engages the reward system, and converging evidence implies it exploits predictions to do so. Both prediction confirmations and errors are essential for understanding one's environment, and music offers many of each as it manipulates interacting patterns across multiple timescales. Learning models suggest that a balance of these outcomes (i.e., intermediate complexity) optimizes the reduction of uncertainty to rewarding and pleasurable effect. Yet evidence of a similar pattern in music is mixed, hampered by arbitrary measures of complexity. In the present studies, we applied a well-validated information-theoretic model of auditory expectation to systematically measure two key aspects of musical complexity: predictability (operationalized as information content [IC]), and uncertainty (entropy). In Study 1, we evaluated how these properties affect musical preferences in 43 male and female participants; in Study 2, we replicated Study 1 in an independent sample of 27 people and assessed the contribution of veridical predictability by presenting the same stimuli seven times. Both studies revealed significant quadratic effects of IC and entropy on liking that outperformed linear effects, indicating reliable preferences for music of intermediate complexity. An interaction between IC and entropy further suggested preferences for more predictability during more uncertain contexts, which would facilitate uncertainty reduction. Repeating stimuli decreased liking ratings but did not disrupt the preference for intermediate complexity. Together, these findings support long-hypothesized optimal zones of predictability and uncertainty in musical pleasure with formal modeling, relating the pleasure of music listening to the intrinsic reward of learning. Abstract pleasures, such as music, claim much of our time, energy, and money despite lacking any clear adaptive benefits like food or shelter. Yet as music manipulates patterns of melody, rhythm, and more, it proficiently exploits our expectations. Given the importance of anticipating and adapting to our ever-changing environments, making and evaluating uncertain predictions can have strong emotional effects. Accordingly, we present evidence that listeners consistently prefer music of intermediate predictive complexity, and that preferences shift toward expected musical outcomes in more uncertain contexts. These results are consistent with theories that emphasize the intrinsic reward of learning, both by updating inaccurate predictions and validating accurate ones, which is optimal in environments that present manageable predictive challenges (i.e., reducible uncertainty).
Topics: Acoustic Stimulation; Adolescent; Auditory Perception; Female; Forecasting; Humans; Learning; Male; Music; Pleasure; Random Allocation; Reward; Uncertainty; Young Adult
PubMed: 31636112
DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0428-19.2019 -
Sexual Health Feb 2016Background Research has highlighted the complex association between female sexual dysfunction (FSD) and distress regarding sexual activity, with decreased physical...
UNLABELLED
Background Research has highlighted the complex association between female sexual dysfunction (FSD) and distress regarding sexual activity, with decreased physical pleasure being an important mediator. The current study aims to elucidate the association between pleasurable and painful genital sensitivity and FSD, and to further investigate whether FSD may be distressing because it prevents the experience of sexual pleasure, induces pain or both.
METHODS
Sexually active women (n=256; median, 22 years; range, 18-49 years) completed web-based questionnaires, including the Self-Assessment of Genital Anatomy and Sexual Function, the Female Sexual Function Index and the Female Sexual Distress Scale.
RESULTS
Women reported their clitoris to be more sensitive than their vagina in terms of having more pleasurable responses (P<0.001), but not more painful responses (P=0.49). In women with FSD (n=36), impaired self-perceived genital sensation was found: they reported significantly less sexual pleasure and orgasm intensity, and more orgasm effort and discomfort within the clitoral and vaginal area than women without FSD (n=220) (P-value<0.05). The odds of having FSD were significantly greater in women with perceived increased discomfort in the vaginal area during stimulation (odds ratio=5.59, P=0.009, 95% confidence interval: 1.53-20.39), but not in the clitoral area.
CONCLUSIONS
The data provide evidence of the relevance of self-perceived genital sensitivity to sexual pleasure and overall sexual experience. Enhancing the pleasurableness of genital sensations, especially during partnered sex, could decrease the likelihood of experiencing pain and concomitant FSD.
Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Clitoris; Female; Humans; Middle Aged; Orgasm; Pain; Pleasure; Sensation; Sexual Behavior; Sexual Dysfunction, Physiological; Sexual Dysfunctions, Psychological; Surveys and Questionnaires; Young Adult
PubMed: 26567764
DOI: 10.1071/SH15160 -
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews Nov 2019Compulsive feeding has been considered as an addicted-like behavior with similarities to drug addiction. Food intake is brain controlled involving a balance between... (Review)
Review
Compulsive feeding has been considered as an addicted-like behavior with similarities to drug addiction. Food intake is brain controlled involving a balance between metabolic and hedonic pathways that modulate respectively how much and what is eaten. Pathological conditions such as compulsive feeding or an eating addiction can interfere with this balance and obesity may develop. Daily feeding times are also centrally controlled by the circadian clock in the suprachiasmatic nucleus. Disruptions of this body clock (e.g., social jet-lag, shift work) lead to eating and metabolic disorders. The circadian pacemaker is intricately connected with the metabolic and hedonic centers controlling feeding, and most importantly, some of these nuclei have clock activity. When the brain circadian system is compromised in eating disorders, such perturbations may be in part the causes of compulsive feeding, night eating and addictive-like eating behavior. Therefore, food intake is regulated by the central circadian-metabolic-hedonic network, which is functionally interconnected to avoid perturbing the eating behavior physiology.
Topics: Animals; Behavior, Addictive; Circadian Clocks; Feeding Behavior; Feeding and Eating Disorders; Humans; Nerve Net; Pleasure
PubMed: 29990504
DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.07.003 -
PloS One 2020From year-to-year, environment is becoming one of the major concerns of human societies. Few studies have investigated the biological processes involved in environmental...
From year-to-year, environment is becoming one of the major concerns of human societies. Few studies have investigated the biological processes involved in environmental scene perception. Here, we initiate a line of research by beginning to study emotional processes involved in this perception. Our results demonstrate a clear distinction between "Clean" and "Polluted" environments according to the pleasure and approach desire ratings they induced. Moreover, women expressed higher pleasure in the "Clean" condition, as did older participants. Finally, rural scenes induced higher pleasure in participants than urban ones.
Topics: Adult; Age Factors; Emotions; Environmental Pollution; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Nontherapeutic Human Experimentation; Pleasure
PubMed: 32584844
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0234210 -
Journal of American College Health : J... Nov 2023ObjectiveWe explored college students' sexual pleasure using a new self-report measure, the Body, Emotions, Sensations, Touch/Trust (B.E.S.T.) Scale of Sexual Pleasure....
ObjectiveWe explored college students' sexual pleasure using a new self-report measure, the Body, Emotions, Sensations, Touch/Trust (B.E.S.T.) Scale of Sexual Pleasure. Data were from 3997 randomly sampled students with a partnered sexual experience. Students completed an online survey about their most recent partnered sexual experience. Data was collected in January 2020. Students find the nonphysical aspects of partnered sex (e.g., emotions, trust, connection with partners) as pleasurable as physical aspects (e.g., behaviors engaged and received, bodily sensations). Self-reported arousal, wantedness, and emotional intimacy were the strongest correlates of male, female, and transgender/gender non-binary students' sexual pleasure. Few sexual behaviors were associated with sexual pleasure and only one - cuddling for women - was associated with greater sexual pleasure. : Students find their partnered sexual experiences pleasurable. Students' sex may be more pleasurable when they feel ready for sex, desire sex, and feel close to their partners.
Topics: Female; Male; Humans; Pleasure; Students; Universities; Sexual Behavior; Sexual Partners
PubMed: 34634225
DOI: 10.1080/07448481.2021.1978461