Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39169117›Full record

ArticleScientific reports2024

The perceived beauty of art is not strongly calibrated to the statistical regularities of real-world scenes.

Alexander Swartz, Alice E Skelton, George Mather, Jenny M Bosten, John Maule, Anna Franklin

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Scientific reports, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing 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

2 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. 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

6 authors.

Alexander SwartzThe Sussex Colour Group, The School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK. a.swartz@sussex.ac.uk.
Alice E SkeltonNature and Development Lab, The School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK.
George MatherThe School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK.
Jenny M BostenSussex Vision Lab, The School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK.
John MauleStatistical Perception Lab, The School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK.
Anna FranklinThe Sussex Colour Group, The School of Psychology, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RH, UK. anna.franklin@sussex.ac.uk.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Aesthetic judgements are partly predicted by image statistics, although the extent to which they are calibrated to the statistics of real-world scenes and the 'visual diet' of daily life is unclear. Here, we investigated the extent to which the beauty ratings of Western oil paintings from the JenAesthetics dataset can be accounted for by real-world scene statistics. We computed spatial and chromatic image statistics for the paintings and a set of real-world scenes captured by a head-mounted camera as participants went about daily lives. Partial least squares regression (PLSR) indicated that 6-15% of the variance in beauty ratings of the art can be accounted for by the art's image statistics. The luminance contrast of paintings made an important contribution to the PLSR models: paintings were perceived as more beautiful the greater the variation in luminance. PLSR models which expressed the art's image statistics relative to real-world scene statistics explained a similar amount of variance to models using the art's image statistics. The importance of an image statistic to perceived beauty was not related to how closely art reproduces the value from the real world. The findings suggest that beauty judgements of art are not strongly calibrated to the scene statistics of the real world.

Identifiers

PMID39169117
PMCPMC11339329

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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.