Sequence of stimuli in a typical trial.

<p>Time (ms) represents stimulus duration. (A) Tasks in low amount (¥4) context (upper panel) and in high amount (¥40) context (lower panel) in Experiment 1; (B) Task in Experiment 2.</p

Difference in subjective rating of pleasure between losses and wins for results of different magnitudes.

<p>Error bars represent standard error (SE). RS, relatively small; RL, relatively large; LC, low amount context; HC, high amount context; *, significant difference of p<.05; **, significant difference of p<.005; ns, non-significant.</p

Grand average ERPs at Fz, FCz, Cz and Pz for four kinds of results in the low amount context (A) and in the high amount context (B).

<p>RS, relatively small; RL, relatively large.</p

Subjective ratings of pleasure.

<p>The difference of pleasure between small and large area symbol results was larger in winning conditions than in lossing conditions. Error bars represent SE. *, significant difference at <i>p</i><.05; ***, significant difference at p<.001; ns, non-significant; SA, small area symbol; LA, large area symbol.</p

The grand average of ERPs at Fz, FCz, Cz and Pz for all four kinds of results.

<p>SA, small area symbol; LA, large area symbol.</p

Activation of reward circuit in the contrast of popular and artistic music.

(A) Popular music evoked larger BOLD response in the right putamen (26, 6,2) than artistic music; (B) Artistic music evoked larger BOLD response in the right rACC than popular music (BA24/32, 12,36,0). (C) Mean beta values and SD of the ROI analysis in putamen and right rACC for popular music and artistic music comparing control condition, respectively. Within every single ROI, beta values of both popular music and artistic music conditions were first subtracted by the mean beta value of control condition in the same ROI, before two sample t-test.</p

The Difference between Aesthetic Appreciation of Artistic and Popular Music: Evidence from an fMRI Study

<div><p>To test the hypothesis that pleasure from artistic music is intellectual while that from popular music is physiological, this study investigated the different functional mechanisms between aesthetic appreciation of artistic and popular music using fMRI. 18 male non-musicians were scanned while they performed an aesthetic rating task for excerpts of artistic music, popular music and musical notes playing and singing (control). The rating scores of artistic and popular music excerpts were both significantly higher than that of control materials while the scores of them were not different. The fMRI results showed both artistic and popular conditions activated the VS and vmPFC, compared with control condition. When contrasted popular and artistic condition directly, we found popular music activated right putamen, while artistic music activated right mPFC. By parametric analysis, we found the activation of right putamen tracked the aesthetic ratings of popular music, whereas the BOLD signal in right mPFC tracked the aesthetic ratings of artistic music. These results indicate the reward induced by popular music is closer to a primary reward while that induced by artistic music is closer to a secondary reward. We also found artistic music activated ToM areas, including PCC/PC, arMFC and TPJ, when compared with popular music. And these areas also tracked aesthetic ratings of artistic music but not those of popular music. These results imply that the pleasure from former comes from cognitive empathy. In conclusion, this study gives clear neuronal evidences supporting the view that artistic music is of intelligence and social cognition involved while the popular music is of physiology.</p></div

Regions showing a main effect at p<0.05 with FDR correction at the cluster level for contrasts Popular music > Artistic music and Artistic music>Popular music.

<p>Regions showing a main effect at p<0.05 with FDR correction at the cluster level for contrasts Popular music > Artistic music and Artistic music>Popular music.</p

Brain activation of popular and artistic music vs. control material.

<p>Larger activity in bilateral mOFC and bilateral ventral striatum were found for popular(A) and artistic(B) music than for control material.</p

Regions tracking increasing aesthetic ratings of popular music and artistic music.

<p>Regions tracking increasing aesthetic ratings of popular music and artistic music.</p