Psychophysiological Experiences 1 Thrills , Chills , Frissons , and Skin Orgasms : 1 Toward an Integrative Model of Transcendent 2 Psychophysiological Experiences in Music 3

Content Provider	Semantic Scholar
Author	Harrison, Luke D. Loui, Psyche
Abstract	7 Music has a unique power to elicit moments of intense emotional and psychophysiological 8 response. These moments – termed “chills,” “thrills”, “frissons,” etc. – are subjects of 9 introspection and philosophical debate, as well as scientific study in music perception and 10 cognition. The present article integrates the existing multidisciplinary literature in an attempt to 11 define a comprehensive, testable, and ecologically valid model of transcendent 12 psychophysiological moments in music. 13 1. Definitions and Scope 14 The present article is about that moment when music resonates so deeply and viscerally as to 15 elicit a physical, bodily response. In trying to describe and test this sensation, we will attempt to 16 clarify the terminology and elaborate on some major pieces of evidence regarding the types of 17 musical movements that elicit transcendent physical experiences. The relevant literature 18 reviewed here is particularly interesting for its necessarily multidisciplinary nature (with inroads 19 into neuroscience, psychology, ethnomusicology, and music analysis) as well as its unavoidable 20 subjectivity in defining these intensely personal experiences. 21 We begin by examining the murky, but understatedly consequential issue of 22 nomenclature: what is a transcendent, psychophysiological moment of musical experience, and 23 how does its lexical treatment fit into popular and academic discourse? How have researchers 24 described this sensation thus far? Which terms work and which fall short? To answer these 25 questions, we draw from the fields of cognitive neuroscience, phenomenology, psychology, and 26 ethnomusicology, each of which comprises a corollary component to the study of music and 27 emotions. 28 Having arrived at a satisfactory operational definition of musical frissons, we will 29 transition into a less abstract discussion of the sensation, roughly dividing its manifestations into 30 the physical and the sociocultural, interspersed with their respective relations to the emotional. 31 With regards to physical responses, we will attempt to provide a taxonomy of highly prevalent 32 psychophysiological responses to music (Craig, 2005; Guhn, Hamm, & Zentner, 2007; Hodges, 33 2011). In doing so, we will present literature linking the intensity of psychophysiological 34 responses to that of emotional responses (Gabrielsson, 2011; Huron, 2006; Koelsch, 2010; 35 Panksepp, 1995; Sloboda, 1991), but will ultimately attempt to unpack the ontological root of 36 musical emotion and problematize monodirectional routes of causation (Levinson, 2000; 37 Panksepp, 1995) between the physical and the (perceived) emotional. We will also briefly 38 discuss the neural substrates of transcendent moments of musical experience, with a focus on 39 their interactions with motivation and reward systems. We will conclude by suggesting future 40 approaches in selection of musical stimuli used to elicit human bodily responses to music. 41 42 Harrison and Loui Transcendent Psychophysiological Experiences 2 2. Chills, Thrills, and Frisson 43 So what is a transcendent, psychophysiological moment of musical experience? In examining 44 this question one might begin by considering a broad, quasi-phenomenological framework such 45 as that proposed by Gabrielsson in 2011. He terms these moments “Strong Experiences with 46 Music (SEM),” based loosely on Maslow’s “Peak Experience” (Maslow, 1962). The criteria for 47 these SEMs include distinctiveness, ineffability, existential or transcendental feelings, and, 48 poignantly, physical or quasi-physical sensations and powerful emotions. The 49 psychophysiological experiences most reported in Gabrielsson’s study were tears (24% of 50 participants), chills/shivers (10%), and piloerection, or gooseflesh (5%). While the use of Strong 51 Experiences with Music provides a verbal framework that succeeds in its resistance to 52 oversimplifying ecologically valid experiences, it is resistant to generalization and therefore 53 untestable other than through the paradigm of self-report. 54 The prevailing terminology in mainstream musical and psychophysiological discourse 55 has tended toward hyperspecificity, to the extent that it is often reductive. The most popular 56 terms in both academic and popular discourse are “chills” and “thrills” (Huron & Margulis, 57 2011), often used interchangeably (Grewe, Nagel, Kopiez, & Altenmüller, 2007; Huron & 58 Margulis, 2011). Both aim at identifying significant and easily testable parts of the transcendent 59 moments at hand, but both suffer from a lack of operative, institutional consensus. 60 “Chills,” the most popular term (Huron & Margulis, 2011), enjoys a ubiquity in popular 61 culture that has left it particularly open to a variety of definitions. There is some consensus that 62 chills entail a rapidly spreading, tingling feeling, but additional traits remain in dispute. Some 63 scholars concretely include gooseflesh in their concept of chills (Guhn, Hamm, & Zentner, 2007; 64 Panksepp, 1995), while some state that gooseflesh is merely a common companion of chills 65 (Grewe, Nagel, Kopiez, & Altenmüller, 2007; Hodges, 2009), and still others claim that 66 gooseflesh is only induced in approximately 50% of all chill responses (Craig, 2005). Even if we 67 reduce chills to the tingling sensation alone, there remains a lack of consensus regarding its 68 location in the body. Grewe, Nagel, Kopiez, & Altenmüller (2007) included a participant’s chills 69 in their analysis only if the she/he reported gooseflesh and/or “‘shivers down the spine,’” (p. 70 300) but two years earlier, Craig found that his participants were most likely to experience chills 71 in their arms, while less then half felt anything in their spine (2005, p. 278). A similar dispute 72 can be found regarding the inclusion of certain psychophysiological measures, most notably Skin 73 Conductance Responses (SCR). Grewe, Nagel, Kopiez, & Altemüller, again, cite SCR as a 74 necessary criterion for inclusion in their analysis of chills, while many other scholars merely 75 consider them a correlate of chills (Craig, 2005; Guhn, Hamm, & Zentner, 2007). 76 Another popular descriptor of this sensation, “thrills,” may provide additional clarity to 77 “chills” in a few crucial ways. Unlike “chills,” “thrills” is defined, not only as a “shudder or 78 tingling throughout the body,” but as one that also includes emotional intensity (Oxford English 79 Dictionary, n.d.). It sidesteps some of the conflicts surrounding “chills,” perhaps for no other 80 reason than that it is less often used. However, the cultural associations conjured by “thrills” are 81 complex and render the term problematic. To a cognitive scientist, a “thrill” may be a tingling 82 sensation, but to the lay participant of a study, the word “thrill” retains a non-physiological 83 meaning that may prove impossible to entirely subvert. This issue already seems to have 84 manifested itself experimentally, as Goldstein (1980) studied this sensation as a “thrill” and 85 found it to be more often elicited by happy music than by sad music, while Panksepp (1995) 86 studied the same phenomenon as a “chill” and found it more often elicited by sad music than by 87 happy music (Panksepp, 1995, p. 194). 88 Harrison and Loui Transcendent Psychophysiological Experiences 3 It is this issue of cultural association that has disqualified the oft-referenced, but rarely 89 used term, “skin orgasm,” despite its uniquely accurate description of the spectrum of musically90 induced emotional phenomena (Panksepp, 1995). The term implies a pleasurable sensation that is 91 paradoxically both universal and variable. It affects different parts of the body depending on the 92 person and circumstances of induction, and retains similar sensory, evaluative, and affective 93 biological and psychological components to sexual orgasm (Mah & Binik, 2001). Furthermore, 94 transcendent, psychophysiological moments of musical experience have been shown to 95 incorporate the same neural reward pathways as such visceral pleasures as food and sex (Blood 96 & Zatorre, 2001). However, the term has not gained scholarly traction, presumably because of its 97 complicated associations with sexual conventions, which differ drastically between cultures, 98 regions, and people. As theoretically accurate as “skin orgasm” may be, it seems unlikely that 99 most potential participants (primarily college students) in studies on the phenomenon would be 100 able to disassociate themselves sufficiently from their individual relationships with sexual 101 orgasm to subvert their own biases. 102 This leaves us with one highly prominent term left to cover: frisson, described by Huron 103 and Margulis as “a musically induced affect that shows close links to musical surprise” and is 104 associated with a “pleasant tingling feeling,” raised body hairs, and gooseflesh (2011, p. 591). 105 One might supplement this domain-specific definition with one from the Oxford English 106 Dictionary, simply, “an emotional thrill.” “Frisson” may be the most accurate and usable term 107 because it integrates emotional intensity with verifiable tactile sensations not localized to any 108 one region of the body. Its relative specificity and obscurity in popular culture allow it to avoid 109 loaded cultural association; furthermore it does not have the thermal priming potential of the 110 cold-inducing, “chills.” 111 In adopting the term “frisson” we would, however, recommend that the term be expanded 112 to include other perceptible but non-dermal reactions such as tears, lump-in-the-throat 113 sensations, and muscle tension/relaxation (Hodges, 2011; Sloboda, 1991) to form a more 114 integrative, generalizable frisson concept. 115 3. The Importance of Context 116 In trying to explain musical frisson, the philosophical literature has addressed varieties of 117 musical qualia, or musical consciousness. Goguen (2004) ar
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