Musical consonance in simple, static auditory stimuli and perceived pleasantness: The role of musical interval, harmonicity, and stimulus duration

Abstract

Many investigations on the emotional responses to music focus on the use of music pieces that contain a plethora of characteristics. This multitude of characteristics hampers the detection of the specific acoustic properties that contribute to the evoked emotions. In the present study, we were interested in the potential contribution of specific acoustical parameters of consonance to induced emotions. We, therefore, manipulated consonance by creating auditory stimuli that lacked the complexity of music by being very well defined in terms of their musical and acoustical characteristics. Specifically, Stimulus Set A was manipulated as a function of musical interval and harmonicity, with frequency components that followed and did not follow the harmonic series, and musical intervals that were consonant or dissonant, while Stimulus Set C was based on a previously utilized consonance manipulation in musical pieces. A duration manipulation was also included given the changes that might occur as a stimulus unfolds in time. Using pleasantness ratings, we found that consonant musical intervals—usually perceived as pleasant—were rated as unpleasant when the component tones contained inharmonic frequencies, while dissonant intervals remained unaffected by harmonicity. These results demonstrate, for the first time, that acoustical and psychoacoustical manipulations of consonance interact and contribute to listeners’ pleasantness ratings. Α trend was observed for the duration with stimuli becoming more unpleasant as their duration increased. Subsequent qualitative comparison of our stimulus manipulation with musical excerpts showed that our stimuli were, in general, judged as less pleasant and that consonant musical excerpts were judged as more pleasant as duration increased, thus potentially pointing to the role of music completion.