A Simulation Theory of Musical Expressivity

Australasian Journal of Philosophy 88 (2):191-207 (2010)
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Abstract

This paper examines the causal basis of our ability to attribute emotions to music, developing and synthesizing the existing arousal, resemblance and persona theories of musical expressivity to do so. The principal claim is that music hijacks the simulation mechanism of the brain, a mechanism which has evolved to detect one's own and other people's emotions.

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10.1080/00048400902941257

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Tom Cochrane
Flinders University

Citations of this work

Emotion descriptions and musical expressiveness.Michelle Liu - 2025 - Mind and Language 40 (1):74-92.
Aesthetic Experience.Antonia Peacocke - 2023 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Moved by Music Alone.Tom Cochrane - 2021 - British Journal of Aesthetics 61 (4):455-470.
Musical Empathy, from Simulation to 4E Interaction.Dylan van der Schyff & Joel Krueger - 2019 - In Antenor Ferreira Corrêa, Music, Speech, and Mind. Associação Brasileira de Cognição e Artes Musicais. pp. 73-108.

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References found in this work

Gut Reactions: A Perceptual Theory of the Emotions.Jesse J. Prinz - 2004 - New York, US: Oxford University Press.
Recreative Minds: Imagination in Philosophy and Psychology.Gregory Currie & Ian Ravenscroft - 2002 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press. Edited by Christoph Hoerl.
Knowledge and the Flow of Information.Fred I. Dretske - 1981 - Revue Philosophique de la France Et de l'Etranger 175 (1):69-70.

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