Smooth as glass and hard as stone?
On the conceptual structure of the aesthetics of materials
Publication date
2023-10
Document type
Forschungsartikel
Author
Organisational unit
Publisher
American Psychological Association
Series or journal
Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts
ISSN
Periodical volume
17
Periodical issue
5
First page
632
Last page
644
Peer-reviewed
✅
Part of the university bibliography
✅
Language
English
Abstract
Following Fechner’s (1876) “aesthetics from below,” this study examines the conceptual structure of the aesthetics of various materials (Werkstoffe)—for instance, leather, metal, and wood. Adopting a technique used by Jacobsen et al. (2004), we asked 1,956 students to write down adjectives that could be used to describe the aesthetics of materials within a given time limit. A second subsample of a broader cross-section of the population (n = 496) replicated the findings obtained with the first subsample. A joint analysis of both subsamples identified the term “smooth” as by far the most relevant term, followed by the other core terms “hard,” “rough,” “soft,” and “glossy.” Furthermore, sensorial qualities (e.g., “warm” and “see-through”) constituted the main elements of the aesthetics of materials, and the great majority of these were haptic qualities (e.g., “cold” and “heavy”). The terms offered were mostly descriptive and of rather neutral valence, according to an additional valence rating study that we conducted with 94 participants. Comparisons between the terms offered for different materials revealed commonalities as well as material specificity of the conceptual structure of the aesthetics. In addition, the word “beautiful,” although by no means representing one of the most relevant terms in this study, still proved its preeminence in aesthetics in general. The results of this study contribute to the corpus of existing studies of the conceptual structure of aesthetics
Version
Published version
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