Viewing online artwork can significantly reduce negative mood and anxiety, according to new research published in Computers in Human Behavior. The findings indicate that this is particularly true among individuals who are more prone to strong emotional reactions while viewing art online.
The study was motivated by the increasing recognition of the positive effects of art on well-being and health. Previous research has shown that viewing art in person, such as visiting an art museum or having artwork in hospital rooms, can improve mood, reduce stress, and enhance well-being.
However, with the rise of digital technology, art is now accessible through screens and online platforms. The researchers wanted to investigate whether looking at paintings on a screen can also have a positive effect on mood.
“Our interest in the potential of online art to support well-being started during COVID,” said study author MacKenzie Trupp, a PhD candidate at the University of Vienna and member of the ART*IS lab. “To do something that might soothe the lock-down blues (so to say), we tested how a virtual ‘trip’ to the art museum could support a range of well-being benefits, including mood, loneliness, anxiety, subjective well-being, and life satisfaction. In that study, we found encouraging results but ended up with more questions than answers.”
“Our main questions that guided the current study were about who could benefit the most from art viewing and how this could be the case. Our initial idea was that the experience while viewing was fundamental.”
To conduct the study, the research team recruited 240 participants from the University of Vienna. The participants viewed an interactive Monet Water Lily art exhibition on Google Arts and Culture. They filled out a questionnaire before and after the art viewing, providing information about their mood, anxiety levels, the pleasure they felt while looking at the art, and how meaningful the experience was to them.
The study found that even a brief period of viewing art online had significant positive effects on mood and anxiety. Participants reported feeling less anxious and in a better mood after looking at the paintings.
The researchers also assessed subjective experiences of pleasure and meaningfulness and found that participants generally enjoyed the art and considered the experience to be meaningful. The study showed that digital art engagement can be an effective well-being intervention, providing a glimpse into the potential of incorporating art into everyday lives.
“There are two top-line takeaways from our study,” Trupp told PsyPost. “First, we provide further evidence that taking a moment out of the day to stop and spend a few minutes viewing art online can reduce negative mood and anxiety. Second, these benefits can be stronger for those who experience more pleasure and meaning from art viewing. Those who want to implement this in their everyday lives could pick art that they especially like and think about why they find it meaningful to increase the chances of well-being support.”
“We were surprised to find that the main mediators, that is, the types of experiences that explained the impact on well-being, were specific to different beneficial outcomes,” Trupp added. “We found that feeling pleasure was important for improving positive mood, while how meaningful the experience was, was important for improving all outcomes.”
Interestingly, the study also revealed that the type of device participants used to view the online art exhibition had an impact on their changes in positive mood. Viewing art on a smartphone was associated with a possible detrimental effect compared to using a laptop or desktop computer. While this finding did not alter the main results of the study, it opens up avenues for further exploration.
Replication studies are needed to confirm the findings and further investigate the circumstances under which online art viewing can have the most significant impacts on well-being. Nonetheless, the results suggest that digital art engagement has the potential to be a valuable tool for designing well-being interventions and expanding access to art for a wider audience.
“One of the caveats to our study that deserves further research is testing how long these types of benefits might last in terms of minutes, hours, or days,” Trupp said. “Further, how might repeated use of art apps or online museums be different or lead to stronger impacts?”
The study, “Who benefits from online art viewing, and how: The role of pleasure, meaningfulness, and trait aesthetic responsiveness in computer-based art interventions for well-being“, was authored by MacKenzie D. Trupp, Giacomo Bignardi, Eva Specker, Edward A. Vessel, and Matthew Pelowski.
