Determinants of Impact: Towards a Better Understanding of Encounters with the Arts

TLDR

The article argues that current methods for assessing the impact of the arts rely on a fragmented and incomplete understanding of the cognitive, psychological, and socio‑cultural dynamics that govern aesthetic experience. The study proposes that a deeper understanding of the interaction between individuals and artworks, through classifying social, cultural, and psychological factors, is essential to grasp how the arts can affect people. The article critiques existing philosophical and empirical approaches, identifies gaps, and proposes three categories of determinants of impact—individual, artwork, and environmental—to explain aesthetic responses. The article concludes that any meaningful attempt to assess the impact of the arts must account for these determinants to capture the multidimensional and subjective nature of the aesthetic experience.

Abstract

The article argues that current methods for assessing the impact of the arts are largely based on a fragmented and incomplete understanding of the cognitive, psychological and socio-cultural dynamics that govern the aesthetic experience. It postulates that a better grasp of the interaction between the individual and the work of art is the necessary foundation for a genuine understanding of how the arts can affect people. Through a critique of philosophical and empirical attempts to capture the main features of the aesthetic encounter, the article draws attention to the gaps in our current understanding of the responses to art. It proposes a classification and exploration of the factors—social, cultural and psychological—that contribute to shaping the aesthetic experience, thus determining the possibility of impact. The 'determinants of impact' identified are distinguished into three groups: those that are inherent to the individual who interacts with the artwork; those that are inherent to the artwork; and 'environmental factors', which are extrinsic to both the individual and the artwork. The article concludes that any meaningful attempt to assess the impact of the arts would need to take these 'determinants of impact' into account, in order to capture the multidimensional and subjective nature of the aesthetic experience.