Article
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Implicit and Explicit Preferences for Golden Ratio
Version 1
: Received: 22 January 2024 / Approved: 23 January 2024 / Online: 24 January 2024 (02:51:09 CET)
A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.
Salera, C.; Vallebella, C.; Iosa, M.; Pecchinenda, A. Implicit and Explicit Preferences for Golden Ratio. Symmetry 2024, 16, 333. Salera, C.; Vallebella, C.; Iosa, M.; Pecchinenda, A. Implicit and Explicit Preferences for Golden Ratio. Symmetry 2024, 16, 333.
Abstract
The golden ratio, also known as Phi (ϕ ≈ 1.618034), attracted the interest of mathematicians, artists, and intellectuals for many centuries, probably from when it was discovered in human anthropometry. Even in recent times, researchers found the presence of golden ratio in Renaissance paintings and aesthetic preferences. The reasons behind the fascination with the golden ratio remain unclear, but it has been suggested that stimuli containing this proportion are often perceived as beautiful. However, evidence is conflicting, and the literature struggles to establish the existence of individual preferences for golden ratio. To gain new insights into the nature of these preferences, one hundred participants completed an implicit association task, with either golden ratio or random stimuli presented with positive or negative words. Participants initially categorized the stimuli based on their assigned categories. Then, we assessed their explicit preferences by asking to rate the stimuli in terms of pleasantness and by completing a line bisection task and the Ultimate Game. The results revealed the typical effects observed in implicit association tasks, with improved response times and accuracy when golden ratio stimuli were associated with positive word categories. In contrast, explicit ratings yielded mixed results. We discuss our findings in relation to previous studies that have explored this issue, highlighting the ongoing debate surrounding preferences for the golden ratio.
Keywords
golden ratio; Phi; implicit association task; IAT; aesthetic preference
Subject
Social Sciences, Psychology
Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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