Relations Between Musical Structures and Perceived and Felt Emotions

There are two kinds of musical emotions: perceived emotion (expressed by musical pieces) and felt emotion (induced in listeners). In this study, we hypothesized that the emotion perceived by people listening to dissonant music and music in a minor key would not necessarily correspond to the one they felt. Twenty-four participants listened to 21 newly composed musical stimuli and rated the intensities of two kinds of emotions by using a two-dimensional evaluation: valence (pleasant/unpleasant) and arousal (active/passive). ANOVA results showed that the perceived emotion did not always coincide with the felt emotion. Participants with music training listened to minor-key, dissonant, and high-note-density music and rated the felt emotion as less unpleasant or more pleasant than the perceived emotion. This finding may lead to a better understanding of why people sometimes like or otherwise enjoy sad music.