Evidence map›Paper›PMID 30073408›Full record

ArticlePsychological research2020

Beholders' sensorimotor engagement enhances aesthetic rating of pictorial facial expressions of pain.

Martina Ardizzi, F Ferroni, F Siri, M A Umiltà, A Cotti, M Calbi, E Fadda, D Freedberg, V Gallese

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Article in Psychological research, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
10citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

10 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Ready-made bodily sensations.Scientific reports · 2025
    Article
  2. Art promotes exploration of negative content.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Article
  7. Visceromotor roots of aesthetic evaluation of pain in art: an fMRI study.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2021
    Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

9 authors.

Martina ArdizziDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy. martina.ardizzi@unipr.it.ORCID http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9185-6784
F FerroniDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy.
F SiriDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy.
M A UmiltàDepartment of Food and Drug, University of Parma, Parma, Italy.
A CottiDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy.
M CalbiDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy.
E FaddaDepartment of Humanities, Social Sciences and Cultural Industries, University of Parma, Parma, Italy.
D FreedbergDepartment of Art History Columbia University, Italian Academy for Advanced Studies, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA.
V GalleseDepartment of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Via Volturno, 39/E, 43121, Parma, Italy.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The present study addresses a novel issue by investigating whether beholders' sensorimotor engagement with the emotional content of works of art contributes to the formation of their objective aesthetic judgment of beauty. To this purpose, participants' sensorimotor engagement was modulated by asking them to overtly contract the Corrugator Supercilii facial muscles or to refrain from any voluntary facial movement while judging the aesthetic value of painful and neutral facial expressions in select examples of Renaissance and Baroque paintings. Results demonstrated a specific increase in the aesthetic rating of paintings showing painful facial expressions during the congruent activation of the Corrugator Supercilii muscles. Furthermore, participants' empathetic traits and expertise in art were found to correlate directly with the amplitude of the motor enactment effect on aesthetic judgments. For the first time, we show the role of bottom-up bodily driven sensorimotor processes in the objective aesthetic evaluation of works of art.

Indexed as

EstheticsFacial ExpressionAdultEmotionsFacial MusclesFemaleHumansJudgmentMaleMuscle ContractionPainPhotic StimulationYoung Adult

Identifiers

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.