Cognitive Fluency: High-Level Processing Dynamics in Art Appreciation

Based on findings that fluency of mental operations is hedonically marked and associated with more favorable evaluations of the processed target (Reber, Schwarz, & Winkielman, 2004a; Winkielman, Schwarz, Fazendeiro, & Reber, 2003) we investigated the contribution of such fluency effects for aesthetic appreciation. Using bogus titles that either facilitated or hindered semantic processing of paintings, fluency was investigated for higher-order cognitive operations on the level of meaning assignment. A cross-modal conceptual priming procedure was used, in which semantically related or unrelated titles, or “no-title” letter strings preceded the presentation of paintings with different degrees of visual abstraction. Results were in accordance with a fluency-affect-liking hypothesis. Related titles produced highest appreciation followed by no titles and unrelated titles conditions. This effect was moderated by the degree of abstraction of the paintings, with fluency effects especially prominent for representational paintings. Results indicated that aesthetic appreciation is partly grounded in the processing dynamics of the viewer and that the phenomenal experience of cognitive-fluency is an intrinsic source for the hedonic value of art.