Effects of affective priming through music on the use of emotion words

Abstract

Understanding how music can evoke emotions and in turn affect language use has significant implications not only in clinical settings but also in the emotional development of children. The relationship between music and emotion is an intricate one that has been closely studied. However, how the use of emotion words can be influenced by auditory priming is a question which is still not known. The main interest in this study was to examine how manipulation of mode and tempo in music affects the emotions induced and the subsequent effects on the use of emotion words. Fifty university students in Singapore were asked to select emotion words after exposure to various music excerpts. The results showed that major modes and faster tempos elicited greater responses for positive words and high arousal words respectively, while minor modes elicited more high arousal words and original tempos resulted in more positive words being selected. In the Major-Fast, Major-Slow and Minor-Slow conditions, positive correlations were found between the number of high arousal words and their rated intensities. Upon further analysis, categorization of emotion words differed from the circumplex model. Taken together, the findings highlight the prominence of affective auditory priming and allow us to better understand our emotive responses to music.