DOMAIN-SPECIFIC OR NOT? THE APPLICABILITY OF DIFFERENT EMOTION MODELS IN THE ASSESSMENT OF MUSIC-INDUCED EMOTIONS

ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to compare the applicability of music-specific and general emotion models – namely the Geneva Emotional Music Scale (GEMS), and discrete and dimensional models – in the assessment of musically induced emotions. 102 participants listened to 16 film music excerpts, and rated the emotional responses evoked by the music excerpts. Intraclass correlations and Cronbach alphas revealed that the overall consistency of ratings was the highest in the case of the dimensional model. However, the GEMS model possessed both the weakest and some of the strongest items among all three models. The dimensional models also outperformed the other two models in the discrimination of music excerpts, and principal component analysis revealed that 89.9% of the variance in the mean ratings of all the scales (in all three models) was accounted for by two principal components that could be labeled as valence (inverted) and arousal. It can be concluded that there is further need to develop music-specific emotion models, as well as to test the existing models in a systematic manner.