Jonna Vuoskoski

• Fleckenstein, Abbigail Marie; Paruzel-Czachura, Mariola; Pypno-Blajda, Katarzyna; Peltola, Henna-Riikka & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Moral echoes: Do morality and humanness affect emotional and aesthetic responses to music? Royal Society Open Science. 13(10). doi: 10.1098/rsos.252167. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Abstract When listening to novel music, extra-musical information about the musician may influence a listener's evaluations of the music. Here, we studied the extent to which information about the musicians’ Humanness, Morality and Sex, conveyed by their vocal timbre and tessitura, affected listeners’ emotional and aesthetic responses to their music. This online, pre-registered experiment followed a 2 (Humanness: Human vs. AI model) × 2 (Vocalist Sex: Male vs. Female) × 3 (Morality: Moral, Immoral, Neutral) mixed factorial design. Participants (n = 400) were randomly assigned to one of four groups, differing in Humanness and Vocalist Sex. Participants read three descriptions depicting a Moral, Immoral and Neutral behaviour and listened to three unfamiliar songs pseudorandomly paired with a description. Emotional and aesthetic responses to each song were measured using validated measures (GEMS-9 scale) and additional items assessing feelings of being Moved, Connected, perceived Beauty, Liking and perceived Creativity. As predicted, linear mixed-effects models revealed significant main effects of Morality for all dependent variables, with Immoral descriptions consistently yielding more negative ratings. Contrary to predictions, we observed no differences in responses to songs based on Humanness, no significant interaction between Morality and Humanness and no effect of Vocalist Sex on responses.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Høffding, Simon (2026). Empathy, Absorption, and the Feeling of Being Moved by Music. In Schiavio, Andrea; Vuoskoski, Jonna K & Kim, Youn (Ed.), Music and the Cognitive Humanities: Interdisciplinary Insights. Oxford University Press. ISSN 9780197755600. p. 196–217. doi: 10.1093/9780197755600.003.0009. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The findings of a recent research concert, MusicLab Copenhagen, illustrate that musical absorption and feeling moved by music appear to be highly similar and interrelated experiences, contributing strongly to listeners’ enjoyment of the music. Both experiences also seem to have an important socio-affective dimension, leading to enhanced positive affect and increased feelings of connectedness to the performers and other audience members. This chapter employs the framework of cognitive humanities, integrating perspectives from music cognition and phenomenology, to clarify the conceptual overlap as well as the subtle differences between the constructs of musical absorption and feeling moved by music. It also outlines a common underlying process: empathic “feeling into” the music.

• Smykovskyi, Andrii; Kerrebroeck, Bravo van; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Palmer, Caroline (2026). Individual Tempo Asymmetries and Coupling Dynamics in Dyadic Musical Synchronization. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society. 48, p. 4659–4665. doi: https:/escholarship.org/uc/item/40q8w4b4. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Interpersonal synchronization supports social interaction by enabling coordinated behavior and shared emotional experience, yet how emotions influence the mechanisms underlying synchronization remains poorly understood. We investigated how emotional feedback influences auditory–motor synchronization between dyadic partners with faster and slower Spontaneous Production Rates (SPR). Nonmusicians completed a joint tapping task with pre-feedback, feedback (matched or mismatched positive or negative), and post-feedback phases. Temporal asynchronies were modeled using a delay-coupled oscillator model to estimate participant-specific coupling parameters. Model comparisons between delay-coupled and zero-delay models showed that allowing for a delay significantly improved model fit. Slower-SPR partners coupled more strongly than faster partners, while feedback valence did not affect coupling strength. Coupling strength was positively associated with arousal in pre-feedback trials and with perceived synchronization success under mismatched feedback trials. These findings demonstrate the role of intrinsic frequency differences and shared feedback structure in organizing interpersonal synchronization and its subjective correlates.

• Lehtonen, Lasse; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Peltola, Henna-Riikka; Ahlsved, Kaj & Tuuri, Kai (2026). Videopelien musiikin kokeminen ja musiikilliset käytänteet. Musiikki. 56(2), p. 15–45. doi: 10.51816/musiikki.185954. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Videopeleistä on muodostunut viime vuosikymmeninä merkittävä osa nykykulttuuria. Lukuisat ihmiset pelaavat ja kokevat niitä arjessaan. Artikkelissa neljä musiikintutkijaa esittelee eri näkökulmista, miten he tutkisivat videopelien musiikkia, sen kokemista ja käytänteitä. Tarjotut näkökulmat liittyvät esimerkiksi ludomusikologiaan eli pelimusiikin ja -äänen musiikkitieteelliseen tutkimukseen, mediatutkimukseen, musiikkipsykologiaan, musiikkisosiologiaan sekä etnomusikologiaan ja kulttuurintutkimukseen.

• Abrahamsson, Liv Merve Akca; Frühholz, Sascha & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Domain-specific perception of emotional intensity in brief musical and vocal expressions. JASA Express Letters. 6(2). doi: 10.1121/10.0042460. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Auditory emotional intensity perception was investigated using behavioral ratings of voice and music stimuli. Principal component analysis revealed distinct domain-specific structures [principal component 1 (PC1) 48%, PC2 11.2%), with the primary dimension for music intensity judgments explaining larger variance. Domain-specific analyses converged on a two-dimensional valence–arousal space, indicating shared structure yet differing variability. These findings advance theoretical understanding of how emotional intensity is organized across auditory domains of voice and music and highlight music as a particularly rich substrate for inter-individual differences in affective intensity perception.

• Hansen, Heidi Marie Umbach; Røysamb, Espen; Vassend, Olav Mandt; Czajkowski, Nikolai Olavi; Endestad, Tor & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina [Show all 8 contributors for this article] (2025). Dimensions of music use motivations: Genetic and environmental underpinnings, and associations with Big Five and Empathy traits. PLOS ONE. 20(8). doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0329808. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  People differ in their motivation for seeking musical experiences and these differences appear to be partially attributable to their personality. However, little is known about the role of genetic and environmental factors in shaping individual differences in motivations for music use and their shared etiology with personality. This study investigated, using the classical twin design in a sample of 2611 Norwegian twins, the genetic and environmental architecture of four dimensions of motivations for music use (musical transcendence, emotion regulation, social bonding, and musical identity and expression). We also examined their phenotypic associations, as well as genetic and environmental overlap with general personality traits, including the Big Five and Trait Empathy facets. Additive genetic and unique environmental effects largely accounted for the variation in the four dimensions (heritability 38%−52%, mean = 45%), though univariate analyses of the social bonding dimension indicated common environmental influences for this specific subscale. In line with previous studies, trait-congruent phenotypic associations were found between specific personality traits and music use motives, including facets of negative emotionality and musical emotion regulation. Other facets – particularly aesthetic sensitivity (open-mindedness) and fantasy (trait empathy) – were closely tied to all dimensions. Multivariate biometric modeling of the links between personality traits and motivations for music use revealed that these relationships were primarily driven by correlated genetic factors, with personality traits accounting for 40%−66% of the total genetic variance and 5%−17% of the total environmental variance in the music use motivation dimensions. These findings shed new light on the etiology of dispositional music use and provide a comprehensive baseline for future investigations of associations with personality, mental health, and well-being.

• Agarwala, Jatin; M.S.S., Sriharsha; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Alluri, Vinoo (2025). Empathy and Music Preferences: Exploring Music Listening Behaviours in Naturalistic Settings. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society. 47. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Empathy has been linked to music preferences in controlled laboratory settings, but naturalistic settings like music streaming platforms remain unexplored. This study investigates how trait empathy influences music preferences and sequential listening behaviors in real-world settings. To this end, we collected and analyzed one-year Spotify listening histories of 290 Indian university students alongside their trait empathy scores, measured using the IRI scale. Our results reveal that individuals who score high on the IRI subscales of Empathic Concern, Fantasy, and Perspective Taking prefer sad music. Moreover, those scoring high on Empathic Concern or Perspective Taking were found to be more likely to transition from happy to sad music. These findings partially align with previous lab-based research, specifically for the subscales of Empathic Concern and Fantasy, while providing novel insights into the relations between the Perspective Taking subscale and music consumption. The study also provides novel insights into sequential listening behaviours, thus, strengthening the evidence that empathy shapes musical preferences and listening behaviors across diverse contexts.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2025). The social dimension of music listening: Empathy and the experience of feeling moved. In Bantinaki, Katerina; Kyprianidou, Efi & Vassiliou, Fotini (Ed.), Empathy and the Aesthetic Mind: Perspectives on Fiction and Beyond. Bloomsbury Academic. ISSN 9781350409552. p. 199–212. doi: 10.5040/9781350409552.0024. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Empathy is a fundamental human capacity that enables us to understand and feel the mental and affective states of others. This capacity is not only restricted to interactions with other humans, but also underpins our engagement with – and responses to – music. This chapter situates the psychological phenomenon of empathy in the context of music listening, and reviews existing empirical evidence on empathy’s role in emotional, neural, and motor responses to music. Multiple strands of evidence suggest that empathy and social cognition play an important role in the affective and pleasurable responses evoked by music. Our social brains resonate with the signs of agency and emotion conveyed by music, eliciting social emotions such as compassion and feeling moved. The social rewards of music listening are grounded in empathic processes, and are able to explain phenomena such as the paradoxical enjoyment of music-induced sadness.

• Høffding, Simon; Bergstrøm, Rebecca Josefine Five; Bishop, Laura; Bravo, Pedro Pablo Lucas; Burnim, Kayla & Cancino-Chacón, Carlos Eduardo [Show all 28 contributors for this article] (2025). Introducing the MusicLab Copenhagen Dataset. Music & Science. 8. doi: 10.1177/20592043241303288. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  MusicLab Copenhagen was a unique research concert featuring the world-renowned Danish String Quartet in a naturalistic setting. The audience was split between one group physically located in the hall, another group listening to a radio broadcast, and a third group watching a live stream. Qualitative and quantitative data were captured from both musicians and audiences, resulting in a comprehensive dataset that can be used to address many research questions. This document introduces the dataset, explains its structure, and reflects on the related data collection, storing, publishing, and archiving processes.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Treider, John Melvin Gudnyson & Huron, David (2024). Does fantasy empathy predict the attribution of virtual agency to music? Musicae Scientiae. ISSN 1029-8649. doi: 10.1177/10298649241258745. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Social emotions have figured prominently in recent research pertaining to music-related emotions. If music is indeed able to evoke social emotions in listeners, the implication is that music may be perceived in some way as akin to a human agent. Yet music, especially instrumental music, is not obviously an agent capable of feeling. Following up on past research linking liking sad music to the fantasy facet of trait empathy, the results of three studies are reported. The first two were online surveys involving 112 and 137 participants, respectively, who rated sets of words in terms of their implied agency, synonymousness, or applicability for describing music. The third involved a listening task in which 299 participants listened to 24 short excerpts of instrumental music, and selected up to 3 words, from a list of 16, that best described each excerpt. The list of 16 words was compiled based on the results of the first two studies and comprised 8 pairs of words that differed in terms of their level of implied agency but were matched in terms of their meaning and applicability to music. Participants also completed the Fantasy subscale of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index. The results did not support the hypothesis that high-fantasy listeners would be more likely to impute (virtual) agency to music. Instead, the attribution of agency was significantly associated with enjoyment and musical arousal.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Martin, Remy Richard; Høffding, Simon; Nielsen, Nanette & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2024). Audience Musical Absorption: Exploring Attention and Affect in the Live Concert Setting. Music & Science. 7. doi: 10.1177/20592043241263461. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical absorption is a multi-dimensional phenomenon that has been understood in various ways, but is related to strong, immersive, and transformative musical encounters. For this exploratory article, we used a phenomenologically and psychologically informed questionnaire to measure audience members’ reports of musical absorption and affective experiences at the MusicLab Copenhagen research concert with the Danish String Quartet (DSQ). We aimed to examine the relation between musical absorption and (1) attention, mind-wandering, and senses of transformation; (2) affective phenomena of feeling moved or touched and awe; (3) social context, as determined by technological mediation of a livestream; (4) musical context (Beethoven, Schnittke, and folk music); and (5) motion. There were 91 participants in the live audience and 43 participants in the livestreaming audience, who completed questionnaires after each piece in the concert and who had their motion measured through an application that recorded accelerometer data from their smartphones. Drawing on methods from experimental psychology, we found that (1) being “absorbed in the music” was not related to mind-wandering, but it was related to a sense of positive transformation; (2) musical absorption was related to experiences of feeling moved, awe, connectedness, and enjoyment, and to being an “admirer” of the DSQ, as well as to being familiar with the music; (3) being at the live concert facilitated more musical absorption than watching the livestream; (4) the final concert section, containing a collection of folk tunes, promoted the most musical absorption; and (5) within the restrained movement dynamics of the live audience, motion trended as an indicator of an embodied experience of musical absorption. We use these results to engage in a phenomenologically informed and empirically enriched discussion of musical absorption and related affective and attentional dynamics.

• Fleckenstein, Abbigail Marie; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Dibben, Nicola (2024). Understanding Musical Beauty. Empirical Studies of the Arts. ISSN 0276-2374. doi: 10.1177/02762374241253771. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Peltola, Henna-Riikka (2024). The Aversive Musical Experience Scale (AMES): Measuring individual differences in the intensity of music-evoked aversion. Psychology of Music. ISSN 0305-7356. doi: 10.1177/03057356241239336. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Strongly disliked music has the capacity to evoke strong negative emotions and physical sensations—at least in some listeners. Although previous (qualitative) studies on disliked music have provided valuable descriptions of listeners’ experiences, more generalizable approaches are needed for understanding individual differences in the intensity of music-evoked aversive experiences. This study set out to explore these individual differences by developing a standardized questionnaire to measure the intensity of aversive musical experiences, the Aversive Musical Experience Scale (AMES). Furthermore, we explored the hypothesized predictors and potential underlying mechanisms (such as emotional contagion and a general sensitivity to sounds) by measuring trait emotional contagion, misophonia, tendency to experience autonomous sensory meridian responses (ASMR) and frissons, and personality. Based on the results of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, a final 18-item version of AMES was constructed, comprising three subscales: Sensations, Social, and Features. Misophonia and emotional contagion emerged as the strongest predictors of global AMES and its subscales. Furthermore, the personality traits of neuroticism, agreeableness, and openness to experience, as well as age and musical expertise emerged as significant predictors of at least one of the scales. The implications and limitations of the findings are discussed with respect to sound-sensitivity, music-induced emotions, and personality theory.

• Treider, John Melvin Gudnyson; Kunst, Jonas R. & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). The influence of musical parameters and subjective musical ratings on perceptions of culture. Scientific Reports. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-45805-w. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Abstract Recent research suggests that music can affect evaluations of other groups and cultures. However, little is known about the objective and subjective musical parameters that influence these evaluations. We aimed to fill this gap through two studies. Study 1 collected responses from 52 American participants who listened to 30 folk-song melodies from different parts of the world. Linear mixed-effects models tested the influence of objective and subjective musical parameters of these melodies on evaluations of the cultures from which they originated. Musical parameters consistently predicted cultural evaluations. The most prominent musical parameter was musical velocity, a measure of number of pitch onsets, predicting more cultural warmth, competence and evolvedness and less cultural threat. Next, with a sample of 212 American participants, Study 2 used a within-subjects experiment to alter the tempo and dissonance for a subset of six melody excerpts from Study 1, testing for causal effects. Linear mixed-effects models revealed that both dissonance and slow tempo predicted more negative cultural evaluations. Together, both studies demonstrate how musical parameters can influence cultural perceptions. Avenues for future research are discussed.

• Akca, Merve; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Laeng, Bruno & Bishop, Laura (2023). Recognition of brief sounds in rapid serial auditory presentation. PLOS ONE. 18(4). doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0284396. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Two experiments were conducted to test the role of participant factors (i.e., musical sophistication, working memory capacity) and stimulus factors (i.e., sound duration, timbre) on auditory recognition using a rapid serial auditory presentation paradigm. Participants listened to a rapid stream of very brief sounds ranging from 30 to 150 milliseconds and were tested on their ability to distinguish the presence from the absence of a target sound selected from various sound sources placed amongst the distracters. Experiment 1a established that brief exposure to stimuli (60 to 150 milliseconds) does not necessarily correspond to impaired recognition. In Experiment 1b we found evidence that 30 milliseconds of exposure to the stimuli significantly impairs recognition of single auditory targets, but the recognition for voice and sine tone targets impaired the least, suggesting that the lower limit required for successful recognition could be lower than 30 milliseconds for voice and sine tone targets. Critically, the effect of sound duration on recognition completely disappeared when differences in musical sophistication were controlled for. Participants’ working memory capacities did not seem to predict their recognition performances. Our behavioral results extend the studies oriented to understand the processing of brief timbres under temporal constraint by suggesting that the musical sophistication may play a larger role than previously thought. These results can also provide a working hypothesis for future research, namely, that underlying neural mechanisms for the processing of various sound sources may have different temporal constraints.

• Thompson, Marc Richard; Mendoza, Juan Ignacio; Luck, Geoff & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Relationships Between Audio and Movement Features, and Perceived Emotions in Musical Performance. Music & Science. 6. doi: 10.1177/20592043231177871. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  A core aspect of musical performance is communicating emotional and expressive intentions to the audience. Recognition of the musician's intentions is constructed from a combination of visual and auditory performance cues, as well as compositional features. The current study attempted to quantify these contributions by measuring relationships between ratings of perceived emotion, and motion and auditory performance features. A pianist and violinist with advanced degrees in music performance individually performed four short western tonal pieces. The musicians were tasked with performing the pieces while invoking different expressive intentions: sad, happy, angry, and as a control, deadpan. To examine how different expressive intentions influenced performance behavior, the musicians’ body movements were tracked using optical motion capture and rendered into point-light animations. Participants rated perceived emotions (happiness, sadness, tenderness, anger) in audio-only, video-only, and audiovisual rating conditions. We first explored how compositional aspects of the music and performers’ expressive intentions contributed to ratings across the three viewing conditions. Through a series of analyses of variance, we found that participants successfully decoded the performers’ expressive intentions based on visual information alone and auditory information alone. In the rating conditions in which audio was present, compositional aspects had a stronger effect on participant ratings than performers’ expressive intentions. Next, we quantified relationships between the ratings and both motion and auditory performance features. Of the features investigated, musical mode had the greatest impact on ratings. Additionally, perceived emotion ratings were more consistent among responders in conditions with audio than without. These results suggest that, in music performance, auditory information is conceptualized by most responders in a similar way, while visual information might be open to a variety of interpretations.

• Gram-Nilsen, Elias & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). The Influence of the Moving Image on Music-Induced Emotions. Psihologijske Teme. ISSN 1332-0742. 32(1), p. 57–80. doi: 10.31820/pt.32.1.4. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The combination of music and the moving image is prevalent in our society, occurring in visual art forms and media such as movies, music videos, and commercials. The relationship between the two has received much interest in existing research, but the focus has mainly been on the influence that music may have on the experience of the moving image. The present study adopts the reverse approach, and examines the potential impact the moving image may have on emotions felt and perceived while listening to music. Sixty-six participants were presented with three music excerpts that were introduced either alone or paired with one of two videos aimed to elicit strong emotions (either awe or being moved). The music excerpts were played a second time (without visual accompaniment) to investigate whether a possible influence of previously presented visual information was persistent. The results revealed that the moving image did have an intensifying effect on emotions induced (both awe and being moved) while listening to music. A significant negative effect on perceived valence and enjoyment was found for the least congruent music & video pairing. Interestingly, this incongruent pairing had the most persistent influence, being the only significant carry-over effect during the second presentation of music alone.

• Swarbrick, Dana & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Collectively Classical: Connectedness, Awe, Feeling Moved, and Motion at a Live and Livestreamed Concert. Music & Science. 6. doi: 10.1177/20592043231207595. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Live concerts normally involve gathering at the same time and place. In livestreamed concerts, participants may gather in time but not in space, providing a natural comparison for studying live concert experiences. Previous research suggests that livestreamed concerts promote more social connectedness than pre-recorded concerts and that live concerts promote more movement than listening to recorded music in a group. However, to the best of our knowledge, a comparison between live and livestreamed concerts has not been conducted. The Danish String Quartet is a critically acclaimed music group who performed a live concert that was also livestreamed. The live and livestreaming audiences’ emotions were measured with surveys that collected data on connectedness, feeling moved, and awe after each piece. In addition, audience motion was measured with an application that recorded from the participants' own smartphones’ accelerometers. Survey responses were collected from 91 live and 32 livestreaming participants. Motion data was collected from 82 live and 25 livestreaming participants. While the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the livestreaming audience, both live and livestreaming audiences felt similarly connected to the performers. Feeling moved and awe were influenced by the piece of music, but not by the audience condition (i.e., live or livestreaming audience). During the classical Beethoven and Schnittke pieces, the live audience moved less, while during the folk tunes, the live audience moved more. The differences between pieces were smaller in the livestreaming audience. The live audience reported more connectedness to the audience when their neighbors moved more during the folk and less during the Beethoven and Schnittke. Connectedness with other audience members was also related to the amount that an individual stilled in response to key musical moments in the pieces. Together, these findings show that the classical concert audience actively engages with the music and the associated socioemotional experience based on genre-specific norms and expectations.

• Herrebrøden, Henrik; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum; Espeseth, Thomas; Bishop, Laura & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Cognitive load causes kinematic changes in both elite and non-elite rowers. Human Movement Science. ISSN 0167-9457. 90. doi: 10.1016/j.humov.2023.103113. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The current motor literature suggests that extraneous cognitive load may affect performance and kinematics in a primary motor task. A common response to increased cognitive demand, as observed in past studies, might be to reduce movement complexity and revert to previously learned movement patterns, in line with the progression-regression hypothesis. However, according to several accounts of automaticity, motor experts should be able to cope with dual task demands without detriment to their performance and kinematics. To test this, we conducted an experiment asking elite and non-elite rowers to use a rowing ergometer under conditions of varying task load. We employed single-task conditions with low cognitive load (i.e., rowing only) and dual-task conditions with high cognitive load (i.e., rowing and solving arithmetic problems). The results of the cognitive load manipulations were mostly in line with our hypotheses. Overall, participants reduced movement complexity, for example by reverting towards tighter coupling of kinematic events, in their dual-task performance as compared to single-task performance. The between-group kinematic differences were less clear. In contradiction to our hypotheses, we found no significant interaction between skill level and cognitive load, suggesting that the rowers' kinematics were affected by cognitive load irrespective of skill level. Overall, our findings contradict several past findings and automaticity theories, and suggest that attentional resources are required for optimal sports performance.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Upham, Finn; Erdem, Cagri; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Measuring Virtual Audiences with The MusicLab App: Proof of Concept. In Michon, Romain; Pottier, Laurent & Orlarey, Yann (Ed.), Proceedings of the 19th Sound and Music Computing Conference. SMC Network. ISSN 9782958412609. p. 532–539. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.6798290. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We present a proof of concept by using the mobile application MusicLab to measure motion during a livestreamed concert and examining its relation to musical features. With the MusicLab App, participants’ own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors can be leveraged to record their motion and their subjective experiences collected through survey responses. The MusicLab Lockdown Rave was an Algorave (live-coded dance music) livestreamed concert featuring prolific performers Renick Bell and Khoparzi. They livestreamed for an international audience who wore their smartphones with the MusicLab App while they listened/danced to the performances. From their acceleration, we computed quantity of motion and compared it to musical features that have previously been associated with music-related motion, namely pulse clarity and low and high spectral flux. By encountering challenges and implementing improvements, the MusicLab App has become a useful tool for researching music-related motion.

• Akca, Merve; Bishop, Laura; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Laeng, Bruno (2022). Human voices escape the auditory attentional blink: Evidence from detections and pupil responses. Brain and Cognition. ISSN 0278-2626. 165. doi: 10.1016/j.bandc.2022.105928. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Attentional selection of a second target in a rapid stream of stimuli embedding two targets tends to be briefly impaired when two targets are presented in close temporal proximity, an effect known as an attentional blink (AB). Two target sounds (T1 and T2) were embedded in a rapid serial auditory presentation of environmental sounds with a short (Lag 3) or long lag (Lag 9). Participants were to first identify T1 (bell or sine tone) and then to detect T2 (present or absent). Individual stimuli had durations of either 30 or 90 ms, and were presented in streams of 20 sounds. The T2 varied in category: human voice, cello, or dog sound. Previous research has introduced pupillometry as a useful marker of the intensity of cognitive processing and attentional allocation in the visual AB paradigm. Results suggest that the interplay of stimulus factors is critical for target detection accuracy and provides support for the hypothesis that the human voice is the least likely to show an auditory AB (in the 90 ms condition). For the other stimuli, accuracy for T2 was significantly worse at Lag 3 than at Lag 9 in the 90 ms condition, suggesting the presence of an auditory AB. When AB occurred (at Lag 3), we observed smaller pupil dilations, time-locked to the onset of T2, compared to Lag 9, reflecting lower attentional processing when ’blinking’ during target detection. Taken together, these findings support the conclusion that human voices escape the AB and that the pupillary changes are consistent with the so-called T2 attentional deficit. In addition, we found some indication that salient stimuli like human voices could require a less intense allocation of attention, or noradrenergic potentiation, compared to other auditory stimuli.

• Herrebrøden, Henrik; Gonzalez, Victor; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Jensenius, Alexander Refsum (2022). Pre-recorded sound file versus human coach: Investigating auditory guidance effects on elite rowers. In Andreopoulou, Areti; Walker, Bruce; McMullen, Kyla & Rönnberg, Niklas (Ed.), Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD2022). The International Community for Auditory Display. ISSN 9780967090481. p. 25–30. doi: 10.21785/icad2022.012. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We report on an experiment in which nine Norwegian national team rowers (one female) were tested on a rowing ergometer in a motion capture lab. After the warm-up, all participants rowed in a neutral condition for three minutes, without any instructions. Then they rowed in two conditions (three minutes each), with a counterbalanced order: (1) a coaching condition, during which they received oral instructions from a national team coach, and (2) a sound condition, during which they listened to a pre-recorded sound file that was produced to promote good rowing technique. Performance was measured in terms of distance traveled, and subjective responses were measured via a questionnaire inquiring participants about how useful the two interventions were for rowing efficiency. The results showed no significant difference between the two conditions of main interest–the pre-recorded sound file and traditional coaching–on any measure. Our study indicates that auditory guidance can be a cost-efficient supplement to athletes’ training, even at higher levels.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Zickfeld, Janis Heinrich; Alluri, Vinoo; Moorthigari, Vishnu & Seibt, Beate (2022). Feeling moved by music: Investigating continuous ratings and acoustic correlates. PLOS ONE. 17(1). doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0261151. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The experience often described as feeling moved, understood chiefly as a social-relational emotion with social bonding functions, has gained significant research interest in recent years. Although listening to music often evokes what people describe as feeling moved, very little is known about the appraisals or musical features contributing to the experience. In the present study, we investigated experiences of feeling moved in response to music using a continuous rating paradigm. A total of 415 US participants completed an online experiment where they listened to seven moving musical excerpts and rated their experience while listening. Each excerpt was randomly coupled with one of seven rating scales (perceived sadness, perceived joy, feeling moved or touched, sense of connection, perceived beauty, warmth [in the chest], or chills) for each participant. The results revealed that musically evoked experiences of feeling moved are associated with a similar pattern of appraisals, physiological sensations, and trait correlations as feeling moved by videos depicting social scenarios (found in previous studies). Feeling moved or touched by both sadly and joyfully moving music was associated with experiencing a sense of connection and perceiving joy in the music, while perceived sadness was associated with feeling moved or touched only in the case of sadly moving music. Acoustic features related to arousal contributed to feeling moved only in the case of joyfully moving music. Finally, trait empathic concern was positively associated with feeling moved or touched by music. These findings support the role of social cognitive and empathic processes in music listening, and highlight the social-relational aspects of feeling moved or touched by music.

• Alluri, Vinoo; Mittal, Anant; SC, Azhagammal; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Saarikallio, Suvi H. (2022). Maladaptive music listening strategies are modulated by individual traits. Psychology of Music. ISSN 0305-7356. doi: 10.1177/03057356211065061. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music listening is a great resource for mental well-being, pleasure, and self-regulation, but it may also be maladaptive. Depression, for instance, has been shown to relate to music use that is characterized by rumination, avoidance, and mood worsening. However, we know little of the role of individual differences in such maladaptive music use. Hence, this study focused on examining the role of personality, empathic traits, emotional contagion, and the types of musical reward as predictors of maladaptive music listening. Participants ( N = 318) answered an online survey comprising measures for the abovementioned traits in addition to the Healthy-Unhealthy Music Scale (HUMS) as a measure of maladaptive music use. Results demonstrated that Unhealthy musical engagement was predicted by a variety of traits representing general negative emotionality (e.g., Neuroticism, Personal Distress, contagion for negative emotions). Structural equation modeling highlighted the importance of the empathic trait Personal Distress in mediating Unhealthy musical engagement. Finally, we deliberate if maladaptive strategies are indeed “maladaptive” for such individuals or merely a coping mechanism, which is indeed adaptive for them, aiding to combat depressive and anxious states thereby preventing them from “tipping over” into depression.

• Onderdijk, Kelsey; Swarbrick, Dana; Kerrebroeck, Bavo Van; Mantei, Maximillian; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Maes, Pieter-Jan [Show all 7 contributors for this article] (2021). Livestream Experiments: The Role of COVID-19, Agency, Presence, and Social Context in Facilitating Social Connectedness. Frontiers in Psychology. 12. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.647929. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical life became disrupted in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many musicians and venues turned to online alternatives, such as livestreaming. In this study, three livestreamed concerts were organized to examine separate, yet interconnected concepts—agency, presence, and social context—to ascertain which components of livestreamed concerts facilitate social connectedness. Hierarchical Bayesian modeling was conducted on 83 complete responses to examine the effects of the manipulations on feelings of social connectedness with the artist and the audience. Results showed that in concert 1, where half of the participants were allowed to vote for the final song to be played, this option did not result in the experience of more agency. Instead, if their preferred song was played (regardless of voting ability) participants experienced greater connectedness to the artist. In concert 2, participants who attended the concert with virtual reality headsets experienced greater feelings of physical presence, as well as greater feelings of connectedness with the artist, than those that viewed a normal YouTube livestream. In concert 3, attendance through Zoom led to greater experience of social presence, but predicted less connectedness with the artist, compared to a normal YouTube livestream. Crucially, a greater negative impact of COVID-19 (e.g., loneliness) predicted feelings of connectedness with the artist, possibly because participants fulfilled their social needs with this parasocial interaction. Examining data from all concerts suggested that physical presence was a predictor of connectedness with both the artist and the audience, while social presence only predicted connectedness with the audience. Correlational analyses revealed that reductions in loneliness and isolation were associated with feelings of shared agency, physical and social presence, and connectedness to the audience. Overall, the findings suggest that in order to reduce feelings of loneliness and increase connectedness, concert organizers and musicians could tune elements of their livestreams to facilitate feelings of physical and social presence.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Seibt, Christa Beate; Grinspun, Noemi & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). Corona Concerts: The Effect of Virtual Concert Characteristics on Social Connection and Kama Muta. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.648448. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The popularity of virtual concerts increased as a result of the social distancing requirements of the coronavirus pandemic. We aimed to examine how the characteristics of virtual concerts and the characteristics of the participants influenced their experiences of social connection and kama muta (often labeled “being moved”). We hypothesized that concert liveness and the salience of the coronavirus would influence social connection and kama muta. We collected survey responses on a variety of concert and personal characteristics from 307 participants from 13 countries across 4 continents. We operationalized social connection as a combination of feelings and behaviors and kama muta was measured using the short kama muta scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019). We found that (1) social connection and kama muta were related and predicted by empathic concern, (2) live concerts produced more social connection, but not kama muta, than pre-recorded concerts, and (3) the salience of the coronavirus during concerts predicted kama muta and this effect was completely mediated by social connection. Exploratory analyses also examined the influence of social and physical presence, motivations for concert attendance, and predictors of donations. This research contributes to the understanding of how people can connect socially and emotionally in virtual environments.

• Hansen, Niels Chr.; Treider, John Melvin Gudnyson; Swarbrick, Dana; Bamford, Joshua S.; Wilson, Johanna & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). A Crowd-Sourced Database of Coronamusic: Documenting Online Making and Sharing of Music During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.684083. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  When a sweeping COVID-19 pandemic forced cultural venues, schools, and social hangouts into hibernation in early 2020, music life relocated to the digital world. On social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok, sofas and balconies took center stage for musical performances presented as live-streamed concerts and recorded videos. Amateurs and professional musicians alike embraced digital formats and innovated novel genres of corona-themed music. Adapting the well-known “musicking” term from cultural musicology (Small, 1999), we will characterize the diverse practices of listening to, playing, dancing to, composing, rehearsing, improvising, discussing, exploring, and innovating musical products during lockdown with explicit or implicit reference to the novel coronavirus and/or pandemic life circumstances as “corona-musicking.” By extension, audiovisual products of such corona-musicking behavior will be defined collectively as “coronamusic.” To best facilitate future work, these definitions are intentionally broad and minimally exclusive (cf. Small, 1999). This study aims to establish the CORONAMUSIC DATABASE–a crowdsourced corpus of links to coronamusic videos and news media reports (https://osf.io/y7z28/). This constitutes the first readily accessible and searchable resource for researchers from all disciplines with an interest in documenting and investigating the musical dynamics underlying the pandemic.

• Zickfeld, Janis Heinrich; Ven, Niels van de; Pich, Olivia; Schubert, Thomas; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Vingerhoets, Ad J.J.M. (2021). Tears evoke the intention to offer social support: A systematic investigation of the interpersonal effects of emotional crying across 41 countries. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. ISSN 0022-1031. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2021.104137. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Tearful crying is a ubiquitous and likely uniquely human phenomenon. Scholars have argued that emotional tears serve an attachment function: Tears are thought to act as a social glue by evoking social support intentions. Initial experimental studies supported this proposition across several methodologies, but these were conducted almost exclusively on participants from North America and Europe, resulting in limited generalizability. This project examined the tears-social support intentions effect and possible mediating and moderating variables in a fully pre-registered study across 7007 participants (24,886 ratings) and 41 countries spanning all populated continents. Participants were presented with four pictures out of 100 possible targets with or without digitally-added tears. We confirmed the main prediction that seeing a tearful individual elicits the intention to support, d = 0.49 [0.43, 0.55]. Our data suggest that this effect could be mediated by perceiving the crying target as warmer and more helpless, feeling more connected, as well as feeling more empathic concern for the crier, but not by an increase in personal distress of the observer. The effect was moderated by the situational valence, identifying the target as part of one's group, and trait empathic concern. A neutral situation, high trait empathic concern, and low identification increased the effect. We observed high heterogeneity across countries that was, via split-half validation, best explained by country-level GDP per capita and subjective well-being with stronger effects for higher-scoring countries. These findings suggest that tears can function as social glue, providing one possible explanation why emotional crying persists into adulthood.

• Granot, Roni; Spitz, Daniel H.; Cherki, Boaz R.; Loui, Psyche; Timmers, Renee & Schaefer, Rebecca S. [Show all 8 contributors for this article] (2021). “Help! I Need Somebody”: Music as a Global Resource for Obtaining Wellbeing Goals in Times of Crisis. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.648013. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music can reduce stress and anxiety, enhance positive mood, and facilitate social bonding. However, little is known about the role of music and related personal or cultural (individualistic vs. collectivistic) variables in maintaining wellbeing during times of stress and social isolation as imposed by the COVID-19 crisis. In an online questionnaire, administered in 11 countries (Argentina, Brazil, China, Colombia, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, the UK, and USA, N = 5,619), participants rated the relevance of wellbeing goals during the pandemic, and the effectiveness of different activities in obtaining these goals. Music was found to be the most effective activity for three out of five wellbeing goals: enjoyment, venting negative emotions, and self-connection. For diversion, music was equally good as entertainment, while it was second best to create a sense of togetherness, after socialization. This result was evident across different countries and gender, with minor effects of age on specific goals, and a clear effect of the importance of music in people's lives. Cultural effects were generally small and surfaced mainly in the use of music to obtain a sense of togetherness. Interestingly, culture moderated the use of negatively valenced and nostalgic music for those higher in distress.

• Peltola, Henna-Riikka & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). “I hate this part right here”: Embodied, subjective experiences of listening to aversive music. Psychology of Music. ISSN 0305-7356. 50(1), p. 159–174. doi: 10.1177/0305735620988596. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Although the majority of previous research on music-induced responses has focused on pleasurable experiences and preferences, it is undeniable that music is capable of eliciting strong dislike and aversion as well. To date, only limited research has been carried out to understand the subjective experience of listening to aversive music. This qualitative study explored people’s negative experiences associated with music listening, with the aim to understand what kinds of emotions, affective states, and physical responses are associated with listening to aversive music. One hundred and two participants provided free descriptions of (1) musical features of aversive music; (2) subjective physical sensations, thoughts and mental imagery evoked by aversive music; (3) typical contexts where aversive music is heard; and (4) the similarities and/or differences between music-related aversive experiences and experiences of dislike in other contexts. We found that responses to aversive music are characterized by embodied experiences, perceived loss of agency, and violation of musical identity, as well as social or moral attitudes and values. Furthermore, two “experiencer types” were identified: One reflecting a strong negative attitude toward unpleasant music, and the other reflecting a more neutral attitude. Finally, we discuss the theoretical implications of our findings in the broader context of music and emotion research.

• Eerola, Tuomas; Vuoskoski, Jonna K.; Kautiainen, Hannu; Peltola, Henna-Riikka; Putkinen, Vesa & Schäfer, Katharina (2021). Being moved by listening to unfamiliar sad music induces reward-related hormonal changes in empathic listeners. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. ISSN 0077-8923. 1502(1), p. 121–131. doi: 10.1111/nyas.14660. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Many people enjoy sad music, and the appeal for tragedy is widespread among the consumers of film and literature. The underlying mechanisms of such aesthetic experiences are not well understood. We tested whether pleasure induced by sad, unfamiliar instrumental music is explained with a homeostatic or a reward theory, each of which is associated with opposite patterns of changes in the key hormones. Sixty-two women listened to sad music (or nothing) while serum was collected for subsequent measurement of prolactin (PRL) and oxytocin (OT) and stress marker (cortisol and adrenocorticotropic hormone) concentrations. Two groups of participants were recruited on the basis of low and high trait empathy. In the high empathy group, PRL and OT levels were significantly lower with music compared with no music. And compared to the low empathy group, the high empathy individuals reported an increase of positive mood and higher ratings of being moved with music. None of the stress markers showed any changes across the conditions or the groups. These hormonal changes, inconsistent with the homeostatic theory proposed by Huron, exhibit a pattern expected of general reward. Our findings illuminate how unfamiliar and low arousal music may give rise to pleasurable experiences.

• Thompson, Marc Richard & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Music as embodied experience. Human Technology. 16(3), p. 227–232. doi: 10.17011/ht/urn.202011256763. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Technology has impacted music’s role in contemporary society in extraordinary ways. In addition to how people use music for professional and artistic pursuits, technology has opened a wide variety of new avenues for research and application, particularly as a reliable therapeutic and salutogenic tool. Recently, a useful framework for studying this shifting perspective surrounding musical experience has emerged: embodied music cognition, which conceptualizes the body as being at the center of music experiences. The papers in this thematic issue highlight how music technologies have matured to the point where they affect the way music is created, performed, enjoyed, and researched.

• Zelechowska, Agata; Sanchez, Victor Evaristo Gonzalez; Laeng, Bruno; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Jensenius, Alexander Refsum (2020). Who Moves to Music? Empathic Concern Predicts Spontaneous Movement Responses to Rhythm and Music. Music & Science. 3. doi: 10.1177/2059204320974216. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Moving to music is a universal human phenomenon, and previous studies have shown that people move to music even when they try to stand still. However, are there individual differences when it comes to how much people spontaneously respond to music with body movement? This article reports on a motion capture study in which 34 participants were asked to stand in a neutral position while listening to short excerpts of rhythmic stimuli and electronic dance music. We explore whether personality and empathy measures, as well as different aspects of music-related behaviour and preferences, can predict the amount of spontaneous movement of the participants. Individual differences were measured using a set of questionnaires: Big Five Inventory, Interpersonal Reactivity Index, and Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire. Liking ratings for the stimuli were also collected. The regression analyses show that Empathic Concern is a significant predictor of the observed spontaneous movement. We also found a relationship between empathy and the participants’ self-reported tendency to move to music.

• Huron, David & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). On the enjoyment of sad music: Pleasurable Compassion Theory and the role of trait empathy. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01060. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Drawing on recent empirical studies on the enjoyment of nominally sad music, a general theory of the pleasure of tragic or sad portrayals is presented. Not all listeners enjoy sad music. Multiple studies indicate that those individuals who enjoy sad music exhibit a particular pattern of empathic traits. These individuals score high on empathic concern (compassion) and high on imaginative absorption (fantasy), with only nominal personal distress (commiseration). Empirical studies are reviewed implicating compassion as a positively valenced affect. Accordingly, individuals who most enjoy sad musical portrayals experience a pleasurable prosocial affect (compassion), amplified by empathetic engagement (fantasy), while experiencing only nominal levels of unpleasant emotional contagion (commiseration). It is suggested that this pattern of trait empathy may apply more broadly, accounting for many other situations where spectators experience pleasure when exposed to tragic representations or portrayals.

• Stupacher, Jan; Witek, Maria; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Vuust, Peter (2020). Cultural familiarity and individual musical taste differently affect social bonding when moving to music. Scientific Reports. 10. doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-66529-1. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Social bonds are essential for our health and well-being. Music provides a unique and implicit context for social bonding by introducing temporal and affective frameworks, which facilitate movement synchronization and increase affiliation. How these frameworks are modulated by cultural familiarity and individual musical preferences remain open questions. In three experiments, we operationalized the affective aspects of social interactions as ratings of interpersonal closeness between two walking stick-figures in a video. These figures represented a virtual self and a virtual other person. The temporal aspects of social interactions were manipulated by movement synchrony: while the virtual self always moved in time with the beat of instrumental music, the virtual other moved either synchronously or asynchronously. When the context-providing music was more enjoyed, social closeness increased strongly with a synchronized virtual other, but only weakly with an asynchronized virtual other. When the music was more familiar, social closeness was higher independent of movement synchrony. We conclude that the social context provided by music can strengthen interpersonal closeness by increasing temporal and affective self-other overlaps. Individual musical preferences might be more relevant for the influence of movement synchrony on social bonding than musical familiarity.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Reynolds, Dee (2019). Music, rowing, and the aesthetics of rhythm. The Senses & Society. ISSN 1745-8927. 14(1), p. 1–14. doi: 10.1080/17458927.2018.1525201. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Having “good rhythm” is essential in both music and competitive rowing, but what exactly constitutes “good rhythm,” and how do we achieve it? Although rhythm is often discussed in purely auditory terms, I argue that rhythm is fundamentally a multisensory, kinesthetic phenomenon. By drawing parallels between music and rowing, I illustrate how biological motion principles underlie the parameters of rhythm in both disciplines, and how the cognition and appreciation of rhythm is deeply embodied. I suggest that the two main ways in which rhythms generate pleasure in both music and rowing are by enabling behavioral synchrony between individuals, and by engaging the body in the cognitive process of rhythm perception and prediction. In essence, “good rhythm”—a rhythm that is enjoyed and appreciated—is rhythm that moves.

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• Schiavio, Andrea; Vuoskoski, Jonna K & Kim, Youn (2026). Music and the Cognitive Humanities: Interdisciplinary Insights. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780197755600. 250 p. doi: 10.1093/9780197755600.001.0001. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music and the Cognitive Humanities explores how the sciences and humanities can work together to understand how people experience and make music. The volume primarily features chapters coauthored by researchers from scientific fields such as experimental psychology or cognitive science and scholars from musicology, philosophy, or performance studies, creating fresh and accessible perspectives on music-related topics such as creativity, empathy, development, and emotion. The result is a unique and highly readable blend of theory and evidence, offering new insights into how body, thought, action, and culture shape our musical lives and understandings. As part of the Music as Art and Science series, the book illustrates how a cognitive-humanistic approach can deepen our understanding of how people think, feel, and act through music. Clear, engaging, and accessible, it is an essential resource for students, scholars, and practitioners interested in the evolving relationship between mind, body, and music. Ultimately, Music and the Cognitive Humanities offers a compelling vision of how integrated research can enrich our understanding of human musicality in the twenty-first century.

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• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Music, AI, and wellbeing: The role of perception. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Tzanaki, Persefoni; Perik, Lieke Dinie Maria & Erdem, Cagri (2026). Trait empathy facilitates rhythmic entrainment and interpersonal synchrony. doi: https:/www.jyu.fi/en/file-download/download/public/67529. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Recent research suggests that cognitive facets of trait empathy may facilitate interpersonal synchrony. However, the contributions of affective trait empathy and state empathy remain underexplored. This study investigated how empathy – both as a dispositional characteristic and as an experimentally induced state – influences rhythmic entrainment and interpersonal synchrony in a musical context. Thirty-three dyads completed two synchrony tasks before and after an empathy induction session. In Task 1, participants tapped with a metronome and then tried to synchronise with their partner's tapping; in Task 2, they tried to play melodies in synchrony. To induce empathy, participants narrated personal events while partners were instructed to either empathise (empathy condition) or memorise factual details (control condition) of the events. Trait empathy was measured using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI; Davis, 1980). Emotional sharing and behavioural mirroring during the empathy induction were assessed using self-report and motion-capture measures. Results showed that both affective and cognitive trait empathy contributed to synchrony: Higher Empathic Concern predicted more consistent tapping in Task 1, and higher Fantasy predicted greater interpersonal synchrony in Task 2. Induced empathy showed no main effects; however, high-Fantasy participants who felt more emotionally engaged with their partners' narrations synchronised better than those who were less engaged. Additionally, high-Fantasy participants showed greater mirroring of narrators' head movements, although this was significant only in the control condition. These findings point to a multifaceted role of empathy in rhythmic and interpersonal synchronisation, suggesting that effective coordination draws on both cognitive and emotional aspects of empathy.

• Smykovskyi, Andrii; Kerrebroeck, Bavo van; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Palmer, Caroline (2026). Individual Tempo Asymmetries and Coupling Dynamics in Dyadic Musical Synchronization. Show summary

  Interpersonal synchronization supports social interaction by enabling coordinated behavior and shared emotional experience, yet how emotions influence the mechanisms underlying synchronization remains poorly understood. We investigated how emotional feedback influences auditory–motor synchronization between dyadic partners with faster and slower Spontaneous Production Rates (SPR). Nonmusicians completed a joint tapping task with pre-feedback, feedback (matched or mismatched positive or negative), and post-feedback phases. Temporal asynchronies were modeled using a delay-coupled oscillator model to estimate participant-specific coupling parameters. Model comparisons between delay-coupled and zero-delay models showed that allowing for a delay significantly improved model fit. Slower-SPR partners coupled more strongly than faster partners, while feedback valence did not affect coupling strength. Coupling strength was positively associated with arousal in pre-feedback trials and with perceived synchronization success under mismatched feedback trials. These findings demonstrate the role of intrinsic frequency differences and shared feedback structure in organizing interpersonal synchronization and its subjective correlates.

• Fleckenstein, Abbigail Marie; Paruzel-Czachura, Mariola; Pypno-Blajda, Katarzyna; Peltola, Henna-Riikka & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Moral Echoes: Do Humanness and Morality Affect Emotional and Aesthetic Responses to Music. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.21416409. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Background: When listening to novel music, extramusical information about the musician may shape listeners’ evaluations. Research outside music suggests that experiences of being moved, empathy, and aesthetic appreciation can be modulated by appraisals of an agent’s morality (Seibt et al., 2017; Singer et al., 2006). In music, such modulations may depend on whether listeners perceive a human agent is present (i.e., human or AI-generated music). Findings on AI-generated music are inconsistent: some studies indicate a bias against AI music (Ansani et al., 2025), whereas others report mixed results (Shank et al., 2023). Aims: The experiment evaluated whether perceived Morality (Moral, Immoral, Neutral) and perceived Humanness (Human vs. AI-model) and influence listeners’ emotional and aesthetic responses to unfamiliar vocal music. Methods: This online experiment used a 2 (Humanness: Human vs. AI-model) × 2 (Vocalist Sex: Male vs. Female) × 3 (Morality: Moral, Immoral, Neutral) mixed factorial design. Participants (N = 400) were randomly assigned to one of four groups. Each participant read three behavioral descriptions (Moral, Immoral, Neutral) and listened to three unfamiliar songs pseudo-randomly paired with the descriptions. Responses were measured using the GEMS-9 (Zentner et al., 2008) plus items assessing feeling Moved, Connected, Beauty, Liking, and Creativity. Results: Linear mixed-effects models showed significant main effects of Morality, with Immoral descriptions consistently yielding lower (i.e., more negative) ratings for nearly all dependent variables with the exception of Unease. There was no main effect of Humanness and no Morality × Humanness interaction. Exploratory analyses indicated that higher Trait Empathy was associated with stronger emotional and aesthetic responses overall, except for the Unease factor. Conclusions: Present findings indicate that perceived immoral behavior, regardless of a perceived human creator, negatively affected listeners’ ratings of positive-valence emotional and aesthetic appraisals of unfamiliar music, consistent with the view that music listening is grounded in socio- cognitive evaluations of the agent behind the work.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). The implications of A(I)gency in music: An fMRI investigation of AI-generated vs. human-composed music. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Would you cry to a song written by AI? Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2026). Experiences of awe and being moved evoked by music: Exploring elicitors and socio-affective and behavioural correlates. doi: https:/iaea-jena2026.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/IAEA26_AllAbstracts_Final.pdf. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Awe and being moved have recently been framed as ‘self-transcendent emotions’ that reduce the salience of the self and direct attention outwards. However, in the context of music listening, such experiences have typically been conceptualised in terms of aesthetic responses or aesthetic emotions. The aim of the two studies presented here was to investigate the extent to which music-induced experiences of awe and being moved are associated with self- transcendence by exploring the elicitors and socio-a􏰀ective and behavioural correlates associated with such experiences. Study 1 was a live concert experiment, where 91 participants listened to a string quartet performing classical and folk music, and reported their felt emotions, social connectedness, and trait empathy. Participants’ body motion was tracked using accelerometers. Being moved correlated positively with enjoyment (r = .59) and feeling connected to the performers (r = .59) and other audience members (r = .48), but only weakly with awe (r = .19). Conversely, awe did not correlate with enjoyment or connectedness to audience members, and only weakly with connectedness to the performers (r = .21). Trait empathy significantly predicted being moved, but not awe. Awe was negatively associated with body motion. Study 2 was an online experiment, where 66 participants heard 3 music excerpts randomly paired with an awe-evoking or moving video, or no video. The experience of chills was significantly predicted by being moved, but not by awe. Being moved was also a stronger predictor of enjoyment. Awe was positively predicted by valence, while being moved was predicted by both valence and arousal. Taken together, the findings suggest that music-induced being moved is associated with prosocial elicitors and increased connectedness, while awe is elicited by vastness and is experienced as less pleasurable. The implications of the findings will be discussed in relation to current theories on self-transcendent emotions.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Gerke, Robin (2026). „Luminiscence“: Warum uns Licht und Live-Musik so sehr bewegen. [Journal]. Westfälische Nachrichten. doi: https:/www.wn.de/muenster/kultur/luminiscence-interview-musikpsychologin-emotionen-3470903?pid=true&ueg=default. Full text in Research Archive
• Abrahamsson, Liv Merve Akca; Egger, Katharina; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Frühholz, Sascha (2025). Brain Responses to Musical Emotions in Autism. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2025). Music, emotion, and the experience of social connection. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Perik, Lieke; Foldal, Christian Dyhre & Stupacher, Jan (2025). Rhythmic complexity and trait empathy modulate internal motor simulation in response to music. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2025). The role of empathy in interpersonal coordination. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Perik, Lieke; Foldal, Christian Dyhre & Stupacher, Jan (2025). Groove and rhythmic complexity modulate internal motor simulation in response to music. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Foldal, Christian Dyhre; Perik, Lieke & Stupacher, Jan (2025). Trait empathy modulates internal motor simulation in response to rhythmic stimuli. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2025). Do socio-affective capacities contribute to rhythm processing? Full text in Research Archive
• Abrahamsson, Liv Merve Akca; Bishop, Laura; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Laeng, Bruno (2024). Are human voices special in the way we attend to them? Full text in Research Archive
• Fleckenstein, Abbigail Marie; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Saarikallio, Suvi (2024). Being Musically Moved. Full text in Research Archive
• Fleckenstein, Abbigail Marie; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Saarikallio, Suvi (2024). Being Musically Moved. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Treider, John Melvin Gudnyson & Huron, David (2024). The attribution of virtual agency to music: Investigating the contributions of trait fantasy and enjoyment. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Treider, John Melvin Gudnyson & Huron, David (2024). The attribution of virtual agency to music predicts liking. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Stupacher, Jan (2024). Investigating internal motor simulation in response to music stimuli with varying degrees of rhythmic complexity. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2024). Some of our favourite songs make us sad, which may be why we like them. [Internet]. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2426284-some-of-our-fav. Full text in Research Archive
• Vrasdonk, Atilla Juliana; Keller, Peter E.; Endestad, Tor & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2024). The influence of improvisational freedom on flow in flamenco duos. Full text in Research Archive
• Abrahamsson, Liv Merve Akca; Bishop, Laura; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Laeng, Bruno (2024). Are human voices ‘special’ in the way we attend to them? Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Music and the experience of social connection. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical engagement – ranging from group music-making to solitary music listening – is an inherently social activity that can facilitate communication, understanding, and connection between individuals and groups. The three studies presented in this talk shed light on the social dimension of musical experiences, focusing on the listener’s perspective. The first study explores the characteristics of virtual concerts and their impact on social connection and felt emotions during the COVID-19 pandemic. The second study compares live and livestreamed concerts and their effects on motion, emotion, the experiences of social connectedness. Finally, the third study investigates experiences of feeling moved in response to music listening, and shows that musically evoked experiences of feeling moved are associated with similar patterns of appraisals, physiological sensations, and empathic processes as feeling moved by videos depicting social scenarios. Together, these studies highlight the importance of social connection and empathy in musical experiences, demonstrating that music can serve as a powerful tool for promoting social bonding and experiences of connectedness.

• Olaisen, Sofie Retterstøl; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Una må danse når ho høyrer musikk: – Eit urgamalt instinkt. [Internet]. NRK. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Urgamle instinkt blir sett i sving når hjernen din oppfattar musikk. No kan forskarane også sjå danselysta i augo dine.

• Swarbrick, Dana & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Exploring the Relationship Between Experiences of Awe, Being Moved, and Social Connectedness in Concert Audiences. Full text in Research Archive
• Swarbrick, Dana; Danielsen, Anne; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). The Effects of “Feeling Moved” and “Groove” On Standstill. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Peltola, Henna-Riikka (2023). Who hates (some) music, and why? Explaining individual differences in the intensity of music-induced aversion. Full text in Research Archive
• Gibbs, Hannah & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). The effects of synchronised drumming and trait empathy on perspective taking and social bonding. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Swarbrick, Dana (2023). Moving together: Exploring the relationship between emotions, connectedness, and motion in concert audiences. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music is able to evoke experiences of being moved and a sense of social connectedness in audiences – even in the context of streamed concerts and recorded music. The present study set out to investigate audiences’ emotional experiences and amount of movement in a classical string quartet concert, which was attend by both a live (N=91) and a livestreaming (N=45) audience. The results revealed that both audiences felt similarly connected to the performers, while the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the livestreaming audience. Reports of ‘being moved’ and awe were influenced more by the piece of music than by the listening context, and the live audience demonstrated distinct motion patterns in response to different musical pieces. The amount of audience movement was also associated with the degree of connectedness experienced towards other audience members. In a follow-up online experiment, 189 participants continuously rated their experience of being moved while watching a recording of the Beethoven string quartet performance from the main concert experiment. Cross-correlations between the continuous ratings and musical features and audience movement patterns were analysed. Overall, the findings demonstrate that the degree of connectedness experienced towards other audience members is modulated by shared presence as well as the amount of audience movement, while experiences of ‘feeling moved’ and awe are influenced by the music itself.

• Grüning, David J.; Kaemmerer, Mareike & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Being Moved by Sad Music Across Countries: Characterising the Experience in Finland, Germany, and France. Full text in Research Archive
• Ranjan, Snehal; Hari, Kancharla Aditya; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Alluri, Vinoo (2023). Sad songs say so much: Analyzing moving music shared online. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Peltola, Henna-Riikka (2023). Who hates (some) music, and why? Explaining individual differences in the intensity of music-induced aversion. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Aversive or disliked music has the capacity to evoke strong negative emotions and physical sensations – at least in some listeners. Although previous (qualitative) studies on aversive and disliked music have provided valuable insights into listeners’ experiences, more generalizable approaches are needed for understanding individual differences in strong aversion to disliked music. This study set out to explore these individual differences by developing a standardised questionnaire to measure the intensity of aversive musical experiences; The Aversive Musical Experience Scale (AMES). Furthermore, we explored potential predictors and hypothesized underlying mechanisms (such as emotional contagion and a general sensitivity to sounds) by measuring trait emotional contagion, misophonia, proneness to experiences of ASMR and frisson, and personality. Based on the results of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, a final 18-item version of AMES was constructed. The global AMES comprises three subscales: Sensations, Social and Features. The Sensations subscale taps into the physical sensations, bodily reactions and feelings associated with aversive musical experiences. The Social subscale comprises items related to social relationships and attitudes in the context of aversive music. Finally, the Features subscale taps into specific musical and acoustic features that participants find aversive. Misophonia emerged as the strongest predictor of global AMES and its three subscales, explaining 9-19 % (adj. R2 change) of the inter-individual variance. Emotional contagion also emerged as a significant predictor, accounting for 2-4 % of the variance in AMES and two of its subscales. Furthermore, the personality traits Neuroticism, Ageeableness, and Openness to experience, as well as age and musical training, emerged as significant predictors of at least one of the scales. The implications and limitations of the findings are discussed with respect to sound-sensitivity, music-induced emotions, and personality theory.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Bosnyak, Dan; Rollo, Susan Marsh; Fu, Nicole; Trainor, Laurel & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). Being in Concert: The Effects of Audience Participation on Motion, Emotion, and Connectedness. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2023). CrowdScience: Why does some music make us sad? [Radio]. BBC World Service. Full text in Research Archive
• Swarbrick, Dana; Upham, Finn; Erdem, Cagri; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Measuring Virtual Audiences with The MusicLab App: Proof of Concept. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We present a proof of concept by using the mobile application MusicLab to measure motion during a livestreamed concert and examining its relation to musical features. With the MusicLab App, participants’ own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors can be leveraged to record their motion and their subjective experiences collected through survey responses. The MusicLab Lock-down Rave was an Algorave (live-coded dance music) livestreamed concert featuring prolific performers Renick Bell and Khoparzi. They livestreamed for an international audience who wore their smartphones with the MusicLab App while they listened/danced to the performances. From their acceleration, we computed quantity of motion and compared it to musical features that have previously been associated with music-related motion, namely pulse clarity and low and high spectral flux. By encountering challenges and implementing improvements, the MusicLab App has become a useful tool for researching music-related motion.

• Herrebrøden, Henrik; Gonzalez, Victor; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Jensenius, Alexander Refsum (2022). Pre-recorded sound file versus human coach: Investigating auditory guidance effects on elite rowers. Full text in Research Archive
• Swarbrick, Dana & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Collectively Classical: Social Connectedness at a Classical Concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Submission: Motivation: Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience. Live concerts are important sociocultural events that normally involve gathering at the same time and in the same space. In livestreamed virtual concerts, participants may gather in time, but not in space, providing a natural manipulation for studying concert experiences. Our previous research indicated that livestreamed virtual concerts can promote more social connectedness than pre-recorded virtual concerts. Additionally, live concerts promote more movement than listening to recorded music in a group. However, to the best of our knowledge, a comparison between live and virtual concerts and their effects on motion and emotion has not yet been conducted. Methodology: The Danish String Quartet is an acclaimed classical music group who performed a concert to both live and livestreaming audiences. Audience members were invited to participate by downloading a smartphone application that records motion with their own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit sensors. Survey responses were collected information on their experience of the music, social connectedness, and the sociorelational emotion of feeling moved before the concert and after each piece. Results: Survey responses were collected from 91 participants in the live audience and 67 participants in the livestreaming audience. Motion data was collected from 79 participants in the live audience and 34 from the livestreaming audience. While analyses are ongoing, preliminary results of the questionnaire data revealed that although the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the virtual audience, both live and virtual audience members felt equally connected to the performers. Implications: This research contributes to the field of embodied music cognition by reinforcing the importance of the social nature of musical experiences.

• Swarbrick, Dana & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Collectively Classical: Social connection at a classical concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We aimed to examine the difference between live and livestreamed concerts, the influence of musical piece, and participant characteristics such as empathy and fan-status on audience social connectedness and feeling moved. Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience. Concerts and the music featured there may facilitate connectedness and the sociorelational emotion kama muta (frequently labelled “feeling moved”) through a variety of mechanisms. Recent research suggests that in virtual concerts, both concert characteristics (e.g. liveness, technological platform) and individual characteristics (e.g. empathy, loneliness, concentration) influence feelings and behaviours associated with social connectedness (Swarbrick et al., 2021; Onderdijk, Swarbrick et al., 2021). Social bonding during collective music listening has previously been demonstrated in the context of dance (Tarr et al., 2016). Questions remain on how concert and personal characteristics influence social connectedness at a live concert and how the effects of live and virtual concerts differ. MusicLab Copenhagen was a concert experiment in which the Danish String Quartet performed to a live (n = 91) and a livestreaming audience (n = 45). Participants responded to questions on their personal characteristics and their social and emotional concert experiences using a questionnaire in response to three distinct pieces of music. Specifically, participants reported feelings of social connectedness that they felt towards the performers and the other audience members, and they responded to the kama muta scale. Although the live audience members felt more socially connected to other audience members than the virtual audience members, both live and virtual audience members felt similarly connected to the performers. There was also a main effect of the piece of music for both social connectedness and feeling moved such that these outcome measures were highest for the folk, then Beethoven, and then Schnittke. When examining awe, the main effect of piece was also present however with awe presenting an opposite trend, with Schnittke producing the highest levels of awe followed by Beethoven and then folk. This research has helped us understand the experience of live and virtual classical concert audiences. Furthermore, this research contributes to a burgeoning field comparing the effects of live and virtual experiences and the implications of their differences on our social well-being. Interdisciplinary implications. The MusicLab Copenhagen project was an interdisciplinary collaboration between psychologists, technologists, musicians, and philosophers. This project offered meaningful perspectives on the challenges and advantages of conducting research on such an interdisciplinary team. The MusicLab Copenhagen model could be employed by future research teams to get the most out of a concert experiment. In this particular study, we combine disciplinary expertise in social psychology and music cognition to better understand participants’ social experience of concerts. References Swarbrick, D., Seibt, B., Grinspun, N., and Vuoskoski, J. K. (2021). Corona Concerts: The Effect of Virtual Concert Characteristics on Social Connection and Kama Muta. Front. Psychol. 12, 1–21. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.648448. Onderdijk, K. E., Swarbrick, D., Van Kerrebroeck, B., Mantei, M., Vuoskoski, J. K., Maes, P. J., et al. (2021). Livestream Experiments: The Role of COVID-19, Agency, Presence, and Social Context in Facilitating Social Connectedness. Front. Psychol. 12, 1–25. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.647929. Tarr, B., Launay, J., and Dunbar, R. I. M. (2016). Silent disco: dancing in synchrony leads to elevated pain thresholds and social closeness. Evol. Hum. Behav. 37, 343–349. doi:10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2016.02.004.

• Swarbrick, Dana & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Collectively Classical: Social connection at a classical concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Background: Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience, together. Concerts and the music featured there may facilitate connectedness and the sociorelational emotion kama muta (frequently labelled “feeling moved”) through a variety of mechanisms. Kama muta is considered a self-transcendent emotion as is awe (Yaden et al., 2017). Recent research suggests that in virtual concerts, both concert characteristics (e.g. liveness, technological platform) and individual characteristics (e.g. empathy, loneliness, concentration) influence feelings and behaviours associated with social connectedness (Swarbrick et al., 2021; Onderdijk, Swarbrick et al., 2021). Social bonding during collective music listening has previously been demonstrated in the context of dance (Tarr et al., 2016). Aims: In a live concert experiment, we aimed to examine how concert and personal characteristics influence social connectedness, kama muta, and awe at a live concert and how the effects of live and virtual concerts differ. Methods: MusicLab Copenhagen was a concert experiment in which the Danish String Quartet performed to a live (n = 91) and a livestreaming audience (n = 67). Participants listened to three distinct pieces of music and responded to a questionnaire that captured their personal characteristics and their social and emotional concert experience. Specifically, participants reported feelings of social connectedness that they felt towards the performers and the other audience members, and they responded to the kama muta scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) and to a selection of items from the awe experience scale (Yaden et al., 2019). Results: The live audience members felt more connected to other audience members than the virtual audience members, but both live and virtual audience members felt equally connected to the performers. The live and virtual audiences felt similar levels of kama muta and awe. However while the pieces of music showed similar effects on both social connectedness and kama muta, the pieces had an opposite effect on awe. Conclusions: Even though live concerts facilitate more togetherness among audience members than livestreamed concerts, livestreaming and virtual audience members experience similar levels of connectedness towards the performers, kama muta, and awe. This indicates that virtual concerts may still be useful tools for performers to strengthen their bonds with their fans. Implications: This research will help us to continue to uncover the benefits of concert attendance on audiences. Furthermore, this research contributes to a burgeoning field comparing the effects of live and virtual experiences and the implications of their differences on our social well-being.

• Akca, Merve; Bishop, Laura; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Laeng, Bruno (2022). Tracing the Temporal Limits of Auditory Information Processing with Pupillometry. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2022). Empathy, Entrainment and Social Bonding. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music is an inherently social phenomenon. Even when we listen to music in solitude, social cognitive and affective processes play an important role in shaping our perception and experience. In my own work, I have explored how empathy in particular facilitates and modulates our engagement with music. Through recent empirical studies, I will demonstrate how empathy contributes to both affective attunement and bodily entrainment to music. Furthermore, I will argue that trait empathy may also facilitate the social bonding effects of musical engagement, whether in the context music listening or interpersonal synchrony. Finally, I will also discuss how feelings of being moved by music could be understood through a ‘social lens’ as experiences and appraisals of connectedness.

• Fu, Nicole; Bosnyak, Dan; Rollo, Susan Marsh; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina; Trainor, Laurel & Swarbrick, Dana (2022). Being in Concert: The effects of audience participation on engagement, kama muta, and connectedness. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). Deeply Human: Sad Songs. [Radio]. BBC World Service . Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). From compassion to being moved: Social emotions evoked by music. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical engagement involves and fosters a number of processes that are associated with empathy, such as emotional contagion, entrainment, and social bonding. One example of such a process is the feeling of ‘being moved’ – a powerful, rewarding experience often accompanied by chills, tears, and a sense of connection. In the past few years, ‘being moved’ has attracted increasing research interest as a distinct emotional response with prosocial functions and motivations – also in the context of the arts (e.g., Wassiliwizky et al., 2015; Eerola et al., 2016). Building on empirical evidence from my recent work, I will argue that experiences of ‘being moved’ in the context of music listening are inherently social responses. I will demonstrate that feelings of being moved are closely related to empathic personality traits and feelings of compassion, and they mediate the enjoyment of music-induced sadness. I will also argue that feeling moved by music is associated with appraisals or experiences of closeness or affiliation.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). Ny forskningsstudie: Musikk demper korona-fortvilelsen best. [Journal]. Aftenposten. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). Episode 89: How Music Can Bridge Cultures. [Internet]. The Science of Happiness Podcast. Full text in Research Archive
• Subramanian, Sidhant; Mittal, Anant; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Alluri, Vinoo (2021). Music or Lyrics? Individual differences associated with listening strategies. Full text in Research Archive
• Gram-Nilsen, Elias & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). The influence of the moving image on musical emotions. Full text in Research Archive
• Dalgard, Joachim; Lartillot, Olivier; Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Guldbrandsen, Erling Eliseus (2021). Absorption - Somewhere between the heart and the brain. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). The social dimension of music cognition. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music is an inherently social phenomenon. Even when we listen to music in solitude, social cognitive processes play an important role in shaping our perception and experience. Building on recent empirical evidence, I will argue that the social dimension of music cognition may be even more important than previously recognized. Through empirical examples, I will demonstrate how listeners make social evaluations on the basis of musical information, how feeling moved by music is associated with appraisals and experiences of connectedness, and how empathy contributes to embodiment of both emotional and rhythmic aspects of music.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2021). Who enjoys listening to sad music and why? Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Why do people sometimes enjoy listening to music that makes them sad? The paradox of “pleasurable sadness” has attracted significant research interest in recent years, but important pieces of the puzzle are still missing. Crucially, not everyone enjoys listening to sad music, and the individual differences between those who enjoy sad music and those don’t can be the key to solving the puzzle. I will present empirical evidence from my recent work involving self-report, psychophysiological and hormonal measures, and discuss the theoretical implications of these findings.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Grinspun, Noemi; Seibt, Beate & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Virtually Together: Concerts during the Coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Swarbrick, Dana; Seibt, Beate; Grinspun, Noemi & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Virtually together: Concerts during the coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. Participants watched at least 15 minutes of an online concert and reported information on the concert characteristics, emotional and social outcomes, and their demographics, motivations, listening technologies, and musical experience. The main outcomes are the Kama Muta Scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) which measures feeling moved, and the social connectedness between the participant and the other attendees and performers. Mediation analyses will examine what aspects led to increased connectedness and feeling moved. 310 participants from 14 countries across the Americas (n = 212), Europe (n = 84), and Asia (n = 12) completed the survey. On average, participants reported on a 5-point scale that they felt moderately connected to the performer (M = 3.7), less connected to other audience members (M =2.3), and moderate feelings of being moved or touched (M = 3.7). Further mediation analyses will aim to understand what concert aspects led to these feelings. This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Vad lyssnar folk på i Borgå, Karis och Jakobstad? [Internet]. https://svenska.yle.fi/artikel/2020/12/04/vad-lyssnar-folk-p. Full text in Research Archive
• Swarbrick, Dana; Grinspun, Noemi; Seibt, Beate & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Quarantine Concerts. Full text in Research Archive
• Swarbrick, Dana; Seibt, Beate; Grinspun, Noemi & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Virtually Together: Concerts during the Coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Background Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. Aims We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. Method Participants watched at least 15 minutes of an online concert and reported information on the concert characteristics, emotional and social outcomes, and their demographics, motivations, listening technologies, and musical experience. The main outcomes are the Kama Muta Scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) which measures feeling moved, and the social connectedness between the participant and the other attendees and performers. Mediation analyses will examine what aspects led to increased connectedness and feeling moved. Results 310 participants from 14 countries across the Americas (n = 212), Europe (n = 84), and Asia (n = 12) completed the survey. On average, participants reported on a 5-point scale that they felt moderately connected to the performer (M = 3.7), less connected to other audience members (M =2.3), and moderate feelings of being moved or touched (M = 3.7). Further mediation analyses will aim to understand what concert aspects led to these feelings. Conclusions This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Eerola, Tuomas (2020). Personality and musicians, The Science and Psychology of Music: From Beethoven at the Office to Beyoncé at the Gym. ABC-CLIO. ISSN 9781440857713. Full text in Research Archive
• Eerola, Tuomas & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Personality and listeners, The Science and Psychology of Music: From Beethoven at the Office to Beyoncé at the Gym. ABC-CLIO. ISSN 9781440857713. Full text in Research Archive
• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2019). Being moved by music: A prosocial emotional response? Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical engagement (music-making, listening and dancing) involves and fosters a number of processes that are associated with empathy, such as emotional contagion, embodied resonance, entrainment, and social bonding. One example of such a process is the feeling of ‘being moved’ – a powerful, rewarding experience often accompanied by chills, tears, and a sense of connection. In the past few years, ‘being moved’ has attracted increasing research interest as a distinct emotional response with prosocial functions and motivations – also in the context of the arts (e.g., Wassiliwizky et al., 2015; Eerola et al., 2016). ‘Being moved’ is typically characterized as a mixed or predominantly positive emotion, with joy and sadness as its main ingredients. In the context of music listening, feelings of being moved are closely related to empathic personality traits, and have been found to mediate the enjoyment of sad music (Vuoskoski & Eerola, 2017). Building on empirical evidence from my recent work, I will argue that the experiences of ‘being moved’ in the context of music listening are inherently social responses with prosocial motivations and functions.

• Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina & Eerola, Tuomas (2019). Trait empathy contributes to the intensity of music-induced emotions: Evidence from self-reports and psychophysiology. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  It has been postulated that empathy and emotional contagion might be some of the fundamental mechanisms through which music induces emotional responses in listeners. Previous studies have reported correlations between questionnaire measures of trait empathy and self-reported intensity of music-induced emotion (particularly in response to sad and tender music), but it is not yet known whether this association only exists at the level of self-report. us, the aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between trait empathy and psychophysiological indices of music-induced emotion. Fi y-four participants heard 10 1-minute music excerpts representing ve di erent emotions (sad, happy, scary, tender, and neutral). For each excerpt, participants rated their liking and the overall intensity of their emotional response, and described their felt emotion using 7 rating scales (happy, tender, peaceful, moved, anxious, and energetic). In addition, participants’ electrodermal activity and heart rate variability (HRV) were measured. Trait empathy was measured using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (Davis, 1980). Trait empathy correlated signi cantly with the mean ratings of overall intensity of felt emotion (averaged across all excerpts; r = .29). Trait empathy also correlated with phasic skin conductance activity in response to sad (r = .28) and tender (r = .33) excerpts, and with high- frequency HRV in response to happy excerpts (r = .36; all p < .05). ese results corroborate previous ndings that have associated trait empathy with the self-reported intensity of music-induced emotions, and provide novel evidence of a similar pattern also on the level of psychophysiology.

• Zelechowska, Agata; Jensenius, Alexander Refsum; Laeng, Bruno & Vuoskoski, Jonna Katariina (2020). Irresistible Movement: The Role of Musical Sound, Individual Differences and Listening Context in Movement Responses to Music. Universitetet i Oslo. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This dissertation examines the phenomenon of spontaneous movement responses to music. It attempts to grasp and illustrate the complexity of this behaviour by viewing it from different perspectives. Unlike most previous studies on music and body movement, this dissertation places the focus on barely visible manifestations of movement, such as those that may occur when listening to music while standing still. The point of departure is a reflection on movement responses to music and why such responses are considered universal among humans. This is followed by a discussion on the different approaches to studying how music ‘inspires’ movement, and an overview of the different factors that can potentially contribute to the emergence of movement responses to music. The first goal of the empirical research was to verify the common conception that ‘music makes us move’ and examine whether such movement responses can be involuntary. Three of the five included papers show that music can, indeed, make people move, even when they try to stand as still as possible. The second goal is to explore different factors that contribute to movement responses to music. Throughout the included papers, several topics are examined, including rhythmic complexity, tempo, music genres, individual differences and playback systems. The theoretical chapters show how these topics fit into three broader components of the music experience: music, listener and context. Overall, the results suggest that several factors seem to increase movement responses to music: the clear underlying pulse in the sound stimuli, the rhythmic complexity, a tempo of around 120 beats per minute, listening on headphones rather than speakers and high empathy of the listener. All in all, this dissertation contributes to bridging several gaps in the literature on music-related body movement. It also broadens the perspective on why, how and when music moves us.

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