David Huron
Society for Music Perception & Cognition, June 17, 2003
A theory of expectation is presented in which feeling states are evoked through the interactoin of four separate response systems. Two systems are active in the pre-outcome epoch (i.e., feelings that occur prior to the expected event), and two additional systems are active in the post-outcome epoch. For convenience, the four systems can be dubbed "imaginative," "tension," "prediction," and "outcome."
Imagining an outcome allows us to take vicarious pleasure (or displeasure), as though the outcome has already happened. You might work overtime because you can imagine the embarrassment of having to tell your boss that a project remains incomplete. Neurological evidence for such a system is evident in patients who fail to anticipate the feelings associated with possible future outcomes (Damasio, 1994).
As the moment of an anticipated event approaches, the body prepares for both motor (arousal) and perceptual activity (attention). The goal is to match arousal and attention to the expected outcome, and to synchronize arousal and attention levels so that they are reached just prior to the event onset. Delaying the onset of the anticipated event causes arousal and attention to be sustained at higher levels than needed, leading to mild stress or tension.
An expected stimulus is more accurately perceived when it is predictable. Since accurate predictions are of real benefit to an organism, there must be psychological rewards and punishments that encourage predictive accuracy and that are independent of the hedonic value of the outcome. Psychological evidence in support of a prediction response is found in the work of Mandler (1975).
Finally, emotions are evoked that reflect appraisals of the pleasantness or unpleasantness of the outcome. Such emotions act as behavioral reinforcements.
This four-system theory is applied to the analysis of music. Detailed, moment-by-moment analyses are presented for common musical devices including the suspension, the anticipation, the appoggiatura, and the deceptive cadence.