Pondering artistic beauty encourages ‘big picture’ thinking
For the latest study, 187 people were recruited to visit Kettle’s Yard gallery during an exhibition of handmade clay objects by pottery artist Lucie Rie.
“Ceramics were ideal for our purposes,” said Schnall. “A glorious painting by an Old Master would be too striking. We needed art that is subtle in form, requiring a focused contemplation of the nature of beauty.”
The Lucie Rie exhibition at Kettle’s Yard.
The Lucie Rie exhibition at Kettle’s Yard.
Participants were randomly split into two groups: the ‘beauty’ group was asked to actively consider and then rate the beauty of each ceramic object they viewed, while the second group just matched a line drawing of the object with the artwork itself.
Example of the line drawing test used in the experiment.
Example of the line drawing test used in the experiment.
All participants were then tested on how they process information, and if it’s in a more practical or abstract way.
For example, does ‘writing a letter’ mean literally putting pen to paper or sharing your thoughts? Is ‘voting’ marking a ballot or influencing an election? Is ‘locking a door’ inserting a key or securing a house?
“These tests are designed to gauge whether a person is thinking in an immediate, procedural way, as we often do in our day-to-day lives, or is attuned to the deeper meaning and bigger picture of the actions they take,” said Dr Elzė Sigutė Mikalonytė, lead author of the study and a researcher at Cambridge’s Department of Psychology.
Across all participants, those in the beauty group scored almost 14% higher on average than the control group in abstract thinking. While they were told the study was about cognitive processes, participants were asked about interests, with around half saying they had an artistic hobby.
Among those, the effect was greater: those with an artistic hobby in the ‘beauty’ group scored over 25% higher on average for abstract thinking than those with an artistic hobby in the control group.
Emotional states of participants were also measured by asking about their feelings while completing the gallery task. Across all participants, those in the beauty group reported an average of 23% higher levels of “transformative and self-transcendent feelings” – such as feeling moved, enlightened and inspired – than the control group.
“Our findings offer empirical support for a long-standing philosophical idea that beauty appreciation can help people detach from their immediate practical concerns and adopt a broader, more abstract perspective,” said Mikalonytė.
Importantly, however, the beauty group did not report feeling any happier than the control group, suggesting that it was the engagement with beauty that influenced abstract thinking, rather than any overall positivity from the experience.
The latest study is part of a wider project led by Schnall exploring the effects of aesthetic experiences on cognition. The project, supported by the Templeton Religion Trust, aims to address whether art can contribute to human flourishing and positive values.
Prof Simone Schnall, Director of the Cambridge Body, Mind, and Behaviour Laboratory.
Prof Simone Schnall, Director of the Cambridge Body, Mind, and Behaviour Laboratory.
“People today are often tethered to their devices, and we usually think in very concrete terms when we’re doing something on a screen,” added Schnall.
“It’s becoming much rarer to zone out and just let the mind wander, but that’s when we think in ways that broaden our horizons. Admiring the beauty of art may be the ideal way to trigger the abstract cognitive processes increasingly lost in a world of screens and smartphones.”
