AESTHETIC DIFFERENCE OF ARTISTIC DESIGN: AN ANALYSIS BASED ON BRAIN NEUROSCIENCE

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Revista Argentina de Clínica Psicológica 2020, Vol. XXIX, N°2, 1137-1144

DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.355 1137

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ESTHETIC

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IFFERENCE OF

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RTISTIC

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ESIGN

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NALYSIS

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ASED ON

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RAIN

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EUROSCIENCE

Bin Zheng

1

_{, Lixiang Gao}

2

_*

Abstract

The various types of art design, such as graphic design, decoration design and costume design, have much to do with aesthetics. Difference in aesthetics may arise from the symmetry, structure lines and contour lines of the art design. In this paper, the aesthetic behavior is explored from the perspective of brain neuroscience, aiming to disclose how the aesthetics of viewers is affected by the interaction between symmetry, structure lines and contour lines of costume design. A total of 100 undergraduate students were selected for an experiment, using costume designs with different symmetries, structure lines and contour lines as the stimuli. Their event related potential (ERP) signals were measured and analyzed in details. The results show that, during aesthetic evaluation, each brain region of the subjects shows obvious hemispherical laterality; the aesthetic score increases with the symmetry of the structure lines and the asymmetry of the contour lines; there is no significant interaction between the structure lines and the contour lines; the peak of P2 components induced by the symmetric structure is significantly larger than that induced by the asymmetry structure; there are significant differences between the left hemisphere, the middle zone, and the right hemisphere, yet an unobvious difference between the frontal area, the top area and the temporal area; there is a significant interaction between the hemispheres and the electrodes. The research results shed important new light on the aesthetic evaluation of artistic design.

Key words: Art Design, Aesthetics, Symmetry, Brain Neuroscience.

Received: 12-03-19 | Accepted: 04-08-19

INTRODUCTION

In daily life, individuals often appreciate and evaluate the art design in life according to materials, colors, styles, functions and their own aesthetic cognition and experience (Müller, Höfel, Brattico et al., 2010). In nature, there are many large and small forms of object images, most of which exist in a symmetrical form. In the initial aesthetics, people generally regard symmetry and asymmetry as the primary criteria of evaluation and three are different contents in different academic fields (Lavazza, 2014). Due to the symmetry of the human body, people have a

1_{Yantai University, School of Architecture, Yantai 264005,}

Shandong, China. 2_{Department of Neurology, 970th Hospital}

of the PLA, Yantai 264000, China. E-Mail: zbglx2002@163.com

more balanced sense of symmetrical vision. However, with the development of the thinking concept of people and society, people have begun to pursue individualized artistic design, exhibiting a new aesthetic form (Yeh, Lin, Hsu et al., 2015, Kirsch Urgesi, & Cross et al., 2016). Modeling is the formation of aesthetic things and the essence of an artistic life is to make life itself an artistic creation (Leder and Nadal, 2014, Brown, Gao, Tisdelle et al., 2011). The art design is intuitive and the audience can experience the real life in the nature plot in front of the art design, mobilizing their senses to appreciate the beauty of the design (Orgs, Hagura, & Haggard, et al., 2013).

At present, people have stepped into a new era of information. The information literacy, cultural ideas and aesthetic forms of people all influence their aesthetic behavior and lifestyle, providing a broad space for the development of

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BIN ZHENG, LIXIANG GAO

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art design (Boccia, Barbetti, Piccardi et al., 2016). The aesthetics is a visual culture, integrating natural beauty, social beauty and artistic beauty to maximize the pursuit for a life full of artistic design and aesthetic taste.

Visual culture constitutes the modern design aesthetics (Zaidel & Nadal, 2011, Bao, Yang, Zhang et al., 2017). People will have different neural responses to different design arts. With the rapid development of ERP technology, the neuroscience can be combined with the psychology and art aesthetics. The ERP formed by different aesthetic stimuli are different and the development of neuroscience provides theoretical and technical support for the exploration of the brain mechanism of aesthetics. The analysis of the aesthetic difference of people can be realized through the analysis of brain waves (Burke, 2013). In this paper, combined with the theory of brain neuroscience, the impact of the interaction between the symmetry, structure lines and contour lines of the costume artistic design on the aesthetics of subjects is studied.

AESTHETIC THEORY OF SYMMETRY

Application of symmetry

From the perspective of human aesthetics, people will find a lot of things that are closely related to symmetry. Some commonly seen symmetries include axisymmetric, rotational symmetry and approximate symmetry. Different symmetrical forms will bring us different aesthetic experience and vision impact (Gosetti-Ferencei, 2014). In order to reflect the individuality, in the art design, people also add some asymmetric internal structure lines to the symmetrical design (Reybrouck and Brattico, 2015). Taking clothing design as an example, when people look at the aesthetics, their top priority is color, followed by style. The asymmetric and the hollow of the design are both personalized designs, presenting visual impact for people (Cheung, Law, & Yip, 2014; Ferrari, Nadal, Schiavi et al., 2017).

Aesthetic Theory

Art design is reflected in all aspects of life, whose greatest characteristics are serviceability, scientificity, rationality and comprehensiveness. It not only has practical functions but also aesthetic functions (Sylcott, Cagan, & Tabibnia, 2013). Aesthetics is a form in which people

perceive and evaluate things, and pursues and continuously develops on the specific unity of reason and sensibility, subjectivity and objectivity (Markussen, 2013). Intuition, emotion and pleasure are the three main characteristics of aesthetics. The essence of aesthetic evaluation is the comprehensive evaluation of based on the comprehensive assessment of various factors such as the external characteristics of the stimulus, the social experience of the subjects, religious beliefs and moral constraints. Combined with the theory of brain neuroscience, two models of aesthetic cognition have been established: Chatterjee and Jacobsen. The influencing factors of the aesthetics of people include symmetry, balance, order and complexity. The aesthetic process is a kind of high-level consciousness activity, which involves the perception, memory, emotion and evaluation of an individual. It has been found that the blood flow of the spindle region and the frontal region of human brains increases when performing the aesthetic activity.

BEHAVIORAL STUDY ON THE IMPACT OF SYMMETRY ON ART DESIGN AESTHETICS

Impact of Symmetrical Elements on Art Design Aesthetics

Different people have different standards of aesthetic evaluation for symmetrical elements. This experiment recruits 100 undergraduate students for compensation. Most of the subjects are right-handed and 14 sets of costume designs are selected as stimulus materials, of which 10 sets are symmetrically and asymmetrically processed with patterns and patches. 5 levels of stimulation pictures are provided for each set of costume according to different designs, which are marked as S1, S2, S3, S4 and S5, increasing in asymmetry. A 5-point scale is used for the aesthetic score and the data obtained is integrated by E-studio. Fig. 1 shows the aesthetic score of the impact of the symmetry of structure lines on the aesthetics. It can be clearly seen that the impact of the structure lines of costume design on the aesthetics of subjects is significant, showing a strong regularity. With the increase of asymmetry, the aesthetic score given by the subjects is lower. Thus, it can be seen that the symmetry of the structure lines will increase the aesthetics of the costume design. Table 1 shows the variance analysis of the impact of the

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AESTHETIC DIFFERENCE OF ARTISTIC DESIGN: AN ANALYSIS BASED ON BRAIN NEUROSCIENCE ₁₁₃₉

Table 1.

An analysis of variance of the effect of structural line symmetry on apparel aesthetics

Source Quadratic sum df Mean square F Sig.

Symmetry

Sphericity 13.473 3.001 3.535 94.706 0.000

Greenhouse-Geisser 13.473 2.181 4.475 94.706 0.000

Huynh-Feldt 13.473 2.345 4.250 94.706 0.000

Lower limit 13.473 1.001 14.473 94.706 0.000

Error Symmetry

Sphericity 9.837 217.899 0.047 — —

Greenhouse-Geisser 9.837 218.856 0.057 — —

Huynh-Feldt 9.837 230.671 0.054 — —

Lower limit 9.837 65.989 0.161 — —

Table 2.

An analysis of variance of influence of contour line symmetry on apparel aesthetics

Source Quadratic sum df Mean square F Sig.

Symmetry

Sphericity 3.116 2.998 1.021 11.677 0.000

Huynh-Feldt 3.116 2.024 1.353 11.677 0.000

Lower limit 3.116 0.998 4.116 11.677 0.000

Error Symmetry

Sphericity 22.417 276.998 0.070 — —

Greenhouse-Geisser 22.417 207.137 0.102 — —

Huynh-Feldt 21.417 206.775 0.106 — —

Lower limit 21.417 65.998 0.314 — —

Figure 1

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The aesthetic score of the influence

of the symmetry of the structure line on

aesthetics

0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5

S5 S4

S3 S2

S1

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symmetry of structure lines on the costume aesthetics. It can be found that the symmetry of structure lines has a significant main effect on the aesthetics of subjects. Figure 2 is the aesthetic score of the impact of symmetry of contour lines on the aesthetics and the result is opposite to that of the structure lines, shoe manifestation is that the aesthetics of the costume is the weakest when the contour lines are completely symmetric. With the increase in the asymmetry of the contour lines, the aesthetics of the costume design is stronger. Table 2 shows the analysis of variance of the impact of the symmetry of structure lines on the

costume aesthetics. It can be found that the symmetry of contour lines has a significant main effect on the aesthetics of subjects and the difference between S1 and S2, S4 and S5 is significant.

Figure 2

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The symmetry of the contour line

affects aesthetic score

0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0

S5 S4

S3 S2

S1

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Impact of the Interaction Effect between Structural Lines and Contour Lines on Art Design Aesthetics

There is an opposite result for the aesthetic score of subjects on the symmetry of structure lines and contour lines, which means that the

symmetry cannot reflect the significant

difference of aesthetics. The same 100 subjects are selected and three costumes are randomly selected. The change of the structural lines and

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contour lines are still divided into 5 levels and the change of direction is added to explore the interaction effect between structural lines and contour lines on art design aesthetics. Figure 3 shows the aesthetic score of the symmetry of structure lines and contour lines. It can be seen from the Figure that the aesthetic score given for the most symmetrical and asymmetrical costume design of structure lines and contour lines by subjects is not high. When the structural lines are symmetric and the contour lines are asymmetric, the aesthetic score is higher. With the increase in the asymmetry of structural lines, the aesthetic score is lower, showing no obvious rules. Table 3 shows the analysis of variance in the aesthetic evaluation of costume with consistent change in the symmetry of structure lines and contour lines. It can be clearly seen that the structural lines and contour lines have different main effect on the aesthetic score and the main effect of contour lines is significant. There is no significant interaction effect between the two. Figure 4 shows the aesthetic scores of inconsistent change in the symmetry of structure lines and contour lines. It can be clearly seen that the more symmetrical the structure lines and the more asymmetrical the contour lines, the higher the aesthetic score, and the stronger the aesthetics of the costume design, which means that when the structural lines are the most symmetrical and the contour lines are the most asymmetrical, the aesthetics of the costume is the strongest. Table 4 shows the variance analysis for the aesthetic evaluation of costume with inconsistent change in the symmetry of structure lines and contour lines and the results are the same as those for consistent change in the symmetry. There is no

significant interaction effect between the structure lines and contour lines.

Figure 3

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The aesthetic score of the uniform

change of the symmetry of structure lines

and outlines

2.60 2.65 2.70 2.75 2.80 2.85 2.90 2.95 3.00

St5 St4

St2 St1

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St3

S1 S2 S3 S4 S5

Figure 4

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Aesthetic scores for inconsistent

changes in the symmetry of structure lines

and contour lines

2.70 2.75 2.80 2.85 2.90 2.95 3.00 3.05 3.10

St5 St4

St2 St1

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St3

S1 S2 S3 S4 S5

Table 3.

An analysis of variance of apparel aesthetic appraisal based on the change of symmetry

between structure line and contour line

Structure line

Sphericity 1.231 3.000 0.314 2.218 0.046

Huynh-Feldt 1.231 2.158 0.404 2.218 0.062

Lower limit 1.231 1.000 1.321 2.218 0.121

Contour line

Sphericity 4.133 3.000 1.265 3.605 0.004

Huynh-Feldt 4.133 1.850 2.615 3.605 0.017

Lower limit 4.133 1.100 5.123 3.605 0.048

Structure line * Contour line

Sphericity 1.270 15.000 0.065 0.853 0.483

Huynh-Feldt 1.270 13.032 0.077 0.853 0.468

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AESTHETIC DIFFERENCE OF ARTISTIC DESIGN: AN ANALYSIS BASED ON BRAIN NEUROSCIENCE ₁₁₄₁

Table 4.

Analysis of variance of apparel aesthetic appraisal based on inconsistent changes in

structure line and contour line symmetry

Structure line

Sphericity 1.076 3.000 0.253 1.700 0.118

Huynh-Feldt 1.076 2.312 0.308 1.700 0.131

Lower limit 1.076 1.060 1.076 1.700 0.174

Contour line

Sphericity 9.848 3.000 2.604 8.147 0.000

Huynh-Feldt 9.848 1.774 5.650 8.147 0.000

Lower limit 9.848 1.100 9.748 8.147 0.003

Structure line * Contour line

Sphericity 0.215 15.000 0.004 0.163 1.200

Huynh-Feldt 0.215 13.049 0.006 0.163 1.020

Lower limit 0.215 1.600 0.225 0.163 0.687

Figure 5

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Behavioral data results (aesthetic

scores)

0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0

S5 S4

S2 S1

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S3

ERP RESEARCH ON COSTUME DESIGN AESTHETICS

Experimental Methods

Females have a stronger response to the aesthetics of costume design. This experiment recruits 35 undergraduates (all females) for compensation, who are all right-handed. The stimulating materials for this experiment are 15 symmetrical images of costume art design, totaling 75 target stimuli. The behavior data and ERP data of the subjects are analyzed. The experimental equipment of the ERP experiment uses the Neurone EEG/ERP-related potential system, which consists of an EEG signal amplifier (Neurone Model Black amplifier) and an

electroencephalogram cap (Ag/AgCl64-lead

Neurone electrode cap), with a sampling frequency of 500 Hz. The electrodes with relatively zero body potentials (reference electrodes) are placed on the left and right side of the breast. In order to obtain a reliable ERP waveform, the original ERP data is analyzed

off-line. The data processing requires the baseline correction, digital filtering, artifact removal and

superimposition averaging, obtaining the

average ERP data map.

Experimental Results and Analysis

Figure 5 shows the behavioral data structure. The aesthetic score of the symmetry of structure lines in the costume design given by 35 subjects is the same as the results of the behavioral experiment in the 3.1 section. The aesthetic score is lower with the increase in asymmetry. Figure 6 shows the ERP waveform induced by symmetry and asymmetry. It can be seen from the Figure that the symmetry of the costume art design induces a significant P2 component. From the FZ, CZ and PZ electrodes, it can be seen that the peak of P2 component induced by the symmetrical structure is significantly greater than that of the asymmetric structure. The P2 component is related to the decision-making of people and the test points are located in the front of the head and the central scalp area. Table 5 shows the peak of P2 induced by symmetric and asymmetrical aesthetics. It is found that there is significant difference in the peak of P2 induced by symmetric and asymmetric structure and there is significant difference between the left hemisphere, the middle zone and the right hemisphere. There is a significant interaction effect between the hemispheres and the electrodes and there is no significant difference between the frontal area, the top area and the temporal area. Table 6 shows the P2 latency induced by symmetric and asymmetric aesthetics and it is found that there is no significant difference in the latency of P2 wave induced by the symmetry and asymmetry. There is no significant difference between the

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left hemisphere, the middle zone, and the right hemisphere and there is significant difference

among electrodes. There is significant

interaction effect between hemispheres and electrodes.

Figure 6

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Symmetry and asymmetry induced event potential wave diagram (FZ, CZ, PZ)

-200 0 200 400 600 800 1000

8 6 4 2 0 -2

μV

ms Symmetry Asymmetry

-200 0 200 400 600 800 1000

6 4 2 0 -2

μV

ms Symmetry Asymmetry

(a) (b)

-200 0 200 400 600 800 1000

4 2 0 -2 -4

μV

ms

Symmetry Asymmetry

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Table 5.

Symmetric and asymmetric aesthetically induced P2 wave peaks /

μ

V

Left hemisphere Center line Right hemisphere

M SD M SD M SD

Symmetry

Frontal area 7.843 3.551 9.323 4.178 7.700 3.602

Top area 5.620 2.061 8.910 2.854 4.920 2.215

Temporal area 4.565 3.531 4.438 3.572 2.817 4.766

Asymmetry

Frontal area 7.114 2.750 8.268 3.245 6.683 2.903

Top area 4.921 1.5820 7.663 2.670 3.915 2.115

Temporal area 4.618 3.916 4.388 2.985 3.340 4.532

Table 6.

Symmetric and asymmetric aesthetically induced P2 latency values /

μ

V

Left hemisphere Center line Right hemisphere

M SD M SD M SD

Symmetry

Frontal area 170.02 34.12 169.22 34.26 169.70 35.18

Top area 188.82 56.02 186.16 50.68 185.00 47.81

Temporal area 202.02 63.80 209.02 77.71 193.50 64.40

Asymmetry

Frontal area 160.76 20.02 159.00 16.42 157.56 17.22

Top area 173.76 39.11 170.36 26.33 168.82 26.75

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AESTHETIC DIFFERENCE OF ARTISTIC DESIGN: AN ANALYSIS BASED ON BRAIN NEUROSCIENCE ₁₁₄₃

CONCLUSIONS

Based on the theory of brain neuroscience, this paper studies the impact of the symmetry of costume artistic design, the interaction of structure lines and contour lines on the aesthetics of subjects. The specific conclusions are as follows:

(1) In the costume artistic design, the structural lines have a greater aesthetic impact on subjects. With the increase in the asymmetry, the aesthetic score given by subjects is lower and the increase in the symmetry of structural lines will increase the aesthetics of costume art design.

(2) With the increase of the asymmetry of structure lines, the aesthetic score is lower and there is different main effect of structural lines and contour lines on the aesthetic score. The main effect of contour lines is significant and there is no significant interaction effect between the two. The more symmetrical of structure lines and asymmetrical of contour lines, the higher the aesthetic score and the stronger the aesthetics of subjects for the costume art design.

(3) The symmetry of the costume art design induces a significant P2 component. There is significant difference in the peak of P2 induced by symmetry and asymmetry and the difference between the left hemisphere, the middle zone and the right hemisphere is significant. There is a

significant interaction effect between

hemispheres and electrodes and the difference between the frontal area, the top area and the temporal area is not significant.

Acknowledgement

This study is supported by Key Project of Art Science in Shandong Province (No. ZD201906239).

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