The Effect of Social Feedback and Listening Context on Subjective Emotional Responses to Music

Recent research suggests that social factors can influence how people emotionally respond to music. This study investigated whether social feedback and the social listening context influenced subjective emotional responses to music. Emotional responses to unfamiliar music in a pilot study were used as social feedback in a subsequent 2 (social feedback: social feedback, no social feedback control) x 2 (listening context: alone, with a friend) between-subjects experimental study. Brisbane university students signed up to the study with a friend and were randomly allocated to complete the study together or alone in adjacent rooms. Participants listened to each music piece and reported their subjective valence, arousal and emotion intensity. Music preference, familiarity and task concentration were also reported in randomly allocated response booklets. The social feedback booklet contained positive and negative social feedback on valence and arousal for each music piece. The no social feedback response booklet contained unemotional, factual album information. Contrary to hypotheses, receiving positive and negative valence social feedback did not influence subjective ratings of valence. However, positive and negative arousal social feedback influenced arousal. The listening context did not influence subjective emotions. The predicted interactive effect of social feedback and listening context on emotional responses to music was not found. As hypothesised, less concentration was reported in social listening conditions compared to solitary conditions. Furthermore, as predicted, subjective liking of the music was consistent across conditions. However, when social feedback was provided, higher levels of music familiarity were reported. While the present study failed to support all hypotheses, the findings support the notion that social feedback can influence how people emotionally appraise and respond to music