Nagy clearly fits the profile of a highly conscientious person—dependable, focused, task-oriented people who enjoy order and rules. These people don't enjoy art for emotional regulation or intellectual engagement. Instead, they view art as an external commodity, useful for improving the aesthetics of their living spaces or for relating to people who are truly interested in it. "Those high in conscientiousness may see art as an extrinsic element in their lives rather than an intrinsic one to explore," explains Dollinger.
The conscientious tend to prefer conventional art to modern paintings or other abstract art, and often approach music from an aesthetic distance, with a cold, logical point of view. They tend to focus on the technical proficiency of the artist or the market value of the work rather than on their own emotional reactions. "Conscientious individuals to some extent are the opposite of artistic, intuitive, and imaginative people and may therefore be more likely to experience art in rational ways," explains Furnham.
There is no gene for jazz
One of the most surprising findings in the field of taste research is that artistic preferences have a strong genetic component. A study of 3,000 twins, for instance, revealed that whether we like jazz or not is partially heritable. Other artistic tastes may also be influenced by genetics.
That is not to say that there is a gene for liking jazz music the way there are genes for eye color or sickle cell anemia. What may be inherited, though, are particulars of personality and aspects of intelligence that influence enjoyment of certain forms of art.
That differences in taste attitudes are heritable stands to reason, given that personality itself is partly genetically determined. The difference between someone who loves torture movies like Saw and someone who loves Pablo Neruda poems may come down to a difference in inherited brain chemistry. The former may be driven to sensation-seeking; the latter may have a more introverted mind that delights in contemplative thought.
Cognitive ability, another factor that influences taste, is also partly genetic. We inherit such capacities as attentional focus, memory, and speed and depth of associative thinking. These skills may help a person understand—and therefore appreciate—the complex and spontaneous nature of jazz, free verse, improv comedy, and other art forms that require mental flexibility.
Intelligence may play yet another role. Satoshi Kanazawa, an evolutionary psychologist at the London School of Economics, proposes that intelligent people may be more likely to acquire evolutionarily novel tastes—that is, a predilection for things that did not exist 10,000 years ago, such as instrumental music. Intelligence, however, may make no difference in the acquisition of evolutionarily familiar tastes, such as vocal music. In addition, Kanazawa suggests, less intelligent people may be less cognizant that people in TV and movies are not real. Since seeing realistic images of people may, for them, seem almost like being with people, they're more likely to enjoy these art forms and spend time consuming them.
Taste is a social act
Today, Giovanni Escalera is the composer and guitarist for the electronic-rock band Sweet Electra. But growing up in Guadalajara, Mexico, he was, he says, a "chubby, weird teenager." When he was 13, he undertook a transformation, turning himself into someone others would notice. He began sporting black eye makeup and a fake ear-piercing—emblems of the bands he loved—and boning up on the hottest punk, new wave, and electronic music at the local record store.
"My friends' mothers would ask me, 'Why are you wearing earrings? Those are for girls!'" he recalls. But Escalera wanted to demonstrate his allegiance to the aesthetic he identified with. By advertising his love for foreign bands whose new sound spoke to him, he hoped to convey his open-minded personality, taking a trait he was proud of and amplifying it so that it was visible to others. Steering his friends to new music they otherwise would not have been aware of reinforced his sense of being cool and ahead of the curve.
In a sense, Escalera was using his taste-hunting abilities to forge an identity. This is the inmost layer of taste formation—using our artistic choices to articulate the story of our lives for ourselves and others. Identity comprises not just the traits that describe us, but also stories about how we became that way, and how we present ourselves to others, explains Dan McAdams, a psychologist at Northwestern University. Tastes are among the primary ingredients in these personal stories. "Tastes come up in people's narratives as a way of signaling who they are," says McAdams.
Taste provides an objective, common reference point. Expressing artistic preferences allows us to signal elements of our personalities, and these cues help us manage others' impressions of us. When you meet a stranger, you don't know much about her personality, but if you both agree a certain song is sad and she then tells you she loves it, you've learned something about her. "People largely agree on the emotional qualities of taste objects," explains Rentfrow.
Deciphering the taste code
If our taste preferences reflect our personalities, does this mean we can accurately judge others based on their tastes? We all form impressions based on people's artistic choices, confident that we can judge their personalities based on the things they love. But decoding people based on taste is not an exact science.
Tags:
artistic choices,
books movies music,
confident woman,
different things,
doorway,
electronic dance music,
exploring music,
favorite music,
john darnielle,
judgments,
music art,
rightness,
road trip,
Sam Gosling,
texas at austin,
university of texas at austin,
visual art
