Why did you buy that shirt, mug, or bookmark? Many day-to-day choices involve an aesthetic dimension. However, investigating these aesthetic decisions is difficult, given the many perceptual, cognitive, and social factors involved. This project investigates to what extent daily-life aesthetic decisions can be understood based on our perceptual experience of various visual feature dimensions (e.g., variety in color, shape, orientation). Hence, we will estimate to what extent real-life aesthetic decisions are ‘in the eye of the beholder’. By creating parametrically-controlled patterns and designs (using the Order & Complexity Toolbox for Aesthetics; OCTA) and applying them to diverse daily-life products, we will replicate findings in the field of empirical aesthetics in more real-life contexts, and answer new questions regarding differences in appreciation across cultures, individuals, and products.

Supervisor:
Dr Eline Van Geert
KU Leuven, Belgium

Eline Van Geert is a postdoctoral researcher in the research unit of Brain & Cognition at KU Leuven. During her PhD, she investigated the role of individual and contextual differences in how we visually experience the world around us. In her postdoctoral research, she develops new approaches to study our appreciation for visual stimuli, with the aim to clarify the extent to which individual and contextual differences in visual sensitivity and experience can explain differences in appreciation.