Abstract
In this project, we will describe a study that will use neurometric indexes during the listening of selected pieces of main Authors in Latin and Italian literature (e.g. Catullo, Ovidio, Dante lirico, Petrarca, Boccaccio, Ariosto) in a sample of 60 voluntary participants. Noteworthy, half of the participants will have a literary formation in their advanced studies (Humanist; as students of literature at the University) while the other half will have other university courses (Not Humanist). The study will apply the gathering of the electroencephalographic (EEG) rhythms variations, as well as the heart rate (HR) and galvanic skin response (GSR) during the listening of the literary excerpts. The neurometric indexes to be employed will be the Approach-Withdrawal (AW), the cerebral Effort (EfI) and the Emotional indexes (EI). Results will be given for the comparisons of the estimated AW, EfI and EI related to the perception of the analyzed poetry in the sample population. ANOVA will show whether the Humanist group will report during the listening of the poem higher values of the AW and EI indexes when compared to the values obtained in the Not Humanist sample. The investigation would like to understand if the perception of the aesthetic experience is significantly modulated by the previous level of specific knowledge experienced by the subjects.
A long tradition of research including classical rhetoric, esthetics and poetics theory, formalism and structuralism, as well as current perspectives in (neuro)cognitive poetics has investigated structural and functional aspects of literature reception.
Despite a wealth of literature published in specialized journals like Poetics, however, still little is known about how the brain processes and creates literary and poetic texts. Still, such stimulus material might be suited better than other genres for demonstrating the complexities with which our brain constructs the world in and around us, because it unifies thought and language, music and imagery in a clear, manageable way, most often with play, pleasure, and emotion (Schrott and Jacobs, 2011).
Can neurocognitive poetics studies advance our understanding of how the mind brain works when processing literature beyond what can be revealed by structural, theoretical, or behavioral studies alone?
The challenge of the present study is to highlight some perceptual mechanisms of our understanding of poetry as based on previous knowledge or just on the aesthetic perception of rhythmic sounds. By measuring with advanced electroencephalographic, electrocardiographic and galvanic skin response activities we could have the possibility to link the perception of the poetry to the activation of the cerebral and emotional structures of the brain.
At the moment no studies are available that measures such perceptions in listeners of poetry of ancient Latin classic. The study will realize for sure a critical departure from the actual state of the art.