< PreviousGrowing Applications of Neuroaesthetics Interest in the study of neuroaesthetics has grown swiftlyover the past 15 years, as is evidenced by neworganizations, conferences, and academic researchfocused on the subject. In 2003, the Academy ofNeuroscience for Architecture (ANFA)78 was formed tobuild collaboration among architects and neuroscientiststo explore the design and development of environmentsbased on human responses. In 2010, The InternationalNetwork for Neuroaesthetics79 was established toexpand and share empirical research in the field. In2016, the Brain Science Institute (BSi) at Johns HopkinsUniversity (JHU) School of Medicine embarked on aninitiative to further accelerate the field of neuroaestheticsthrough the creation of the International Arts + Mind Lab(IAM Lab).80Not surprisingly, neuroscience and aesthetics fascinatesthe public and the media. Today, newspapers,magazines and blogs are full of examples of applicationsof neuroaesthetics principles: architects improvinghousing for the health and wellbeing of the elderly,homeless and imprisoned; museums and advertisersusing brain research to make their exhibits and productsmore engaging and appealing; cities building naturalplaygrounds made of recycled trees and boulders; anduniversities launching programs to prepare students forcareers in computer games and virtual reality. New media and technology are making adaptive andimmersive design and aesthetic experiences moreaccessible. Brain research is becoming more abundantand applied in new ways all the time. There are manyopportunities for neuroaesthetics to grow as a field. Butwe ask, to what end, and how?History and Definition of Neuroasthetics19IAM Lab exists to help shape and grow theneuroaesthetics field through increasedcollaboration and research among brain scientistsand practitioners in architecture, music, and otherfine arts. At the core of IAM Lab’s mission aremultidisciplinary research-to-practice efforts focusedon investigating impact across the areas of health,wellbeing, and learning. Since 2007, BSi has led this type of joint intellectualendeavor at Johns Hopkins, creating the workinggroup model that is now used for research across theJHU School of Medicine and hosting the seminal“The Science of the Arts” conference in 2010. BSialso promulgated the Drug Discovery translationalprogram, taking its basic discoveries from the benchto pharmaceutical applications.IAM Lab carries that tradition of translationalresearch forward through a lens of broader socialchange and impact. To accomplish this mission andhelp frame the appropriate research questions, IAMLab is reaching out to researchers, clinicians,architects, artists, musicians, schools, associations,and others interested in research at the intersectionof the arts and brain science and is building a robustinterdisciplinary community.IAM Lab and the Landscape ofArts and Science Collaboration IAM Lab’s institutional roots at Johns Hopkins makepossible the convergence of studies and field-leadingadvancements in brain science, medicine, public health,education, public policy, and music cognition. In thebroader Baltimore community, the Maryland InstituteCollege of Art, American Visionary Arts Museum, andBaltimore Museum of Art, among others, enrich the IAMLab with a corps of collaborating designers and artists. Globally, our approach includes collaborating withleading art, architecture, and music organizations thatare spearheading their own research agendas todocument and evaluate the impact of their programs.We are learning from their ideas, but also their commonchallenges. How can we use neuroaesthetics to solveintractable problems related to health,wellbeing and learning for diversepopulations? IAM Lab is working with the following organizations toanswer questions that have lasting impact across anumber of disciplines. Their research questions include: Can making art help service members withpost-traumatic stress disorder and traumaticbrain injury?National Endowment for the Arts: As previouslyreferenced, Creative Forces: NEA Military Healing ArtsNetwork is a partnership of the National Endowment forthe Arts, the Department of Defense and theDepartment of Veterans Affairs that includes a creativearts therapist as part of a team approach to helping healservice members and veterans who are confronting thewounds of war. Creative Forces is seeking betterevidence of the impact of its programs on post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury anda scalable model for its promising mask-makingprogram. Can immersive, entertaining therapy helpstroke patients recover faster?Johns Hopkins Brain, Learning and Animation Lab(BLAM): BLAM makes movement more motivating andrewarding by combining what we know about learningand brain plasticity with what we know about whatpeople love to watch for fun, like Pixar movies, topromote faster recovery for stroke patients. BLAM putsstroke patients in a dolphin simulator and enables themto “swim” through a blue ocean world to regain theirmobility. BLAM’s goal is to understand whether/howthis art-enhanced approach improves recovery overtraditional therapies. Can the arts advance global understanding? Silkroad Ensemble: Inspired by the exchange of ideasand traditions along the historical Silk Road, cellist Yo-YoMa established Silkroad in 1998 to create music thatengages difference. Silkroad musicians are alsoteachers, producers, and advocates. Off the stage, theylead professional development and musician trainingworkshops create residency programs in schools,museums, and communities of all sizes to shareSilkroad’s model of radical cultural collaboration.Can the design of a hospital for children with developmental disabilities enhance their health and learning outcomes?The Kennedy Krieger Institute (KKI): Kennedy Kriegeroffers patient care, research, and training and a numberof school and community-based programs forindividuals with developmental disabilities. KKI isbuilding a healing room and seeks to applyneuroaesthetics research to its design to aid in betteroutcomes for patients and families. Can the architecture of hospitals, prisons, and schools improve health, wellbeing, andlearning outcomes? Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture: The missionof the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture is topromote and advance knowledge that linksneuroscience research to a growing understanding ofhuman responses to the built environment. TheAcademy benefits from the expanding body of researchthat has evolved within the neuroscience community inthe last two decades, and the promise of even more inthe coming century. Can music restore speech function for peoplewith Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s?Johns Hopkins Center for Music and Medicine seeks tointegrate music and rhythm into medical care andimprove the health of musicians worldwide. More than80 Johns Hopkins faculty members across dozens ofdisciplines have affiliated themselves with the center.The Center seeks to extend research on music’s impacton anxiety and dementia to understand its impact onParkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases. While renowned in their fields, each of our partners isseeking support from a new organization like IAM Lab tolead, conduct, commission, and/or apply the kind ofrigorous neuroaesthetics research it seeks for translationinto evidence-based practice and replicable andscalable programs.In addition to its global partners, IAM Lab is learningfrom other interdisciplinary research efforts across thecountry as it approaches its own research agenda andframework. Leaders in multidisciplinary researchinclude: The MIT Media Labis focused on the study, invention,and creative use of digital technologies to enhance theways that people think, express, and communicateideas and explore new scientific frontiers. The Labbrings together product designers, nanotechnologists,data-visualization experts, industry researchers, andpioneers of computer interfaces to develop and test newtechnologies and has spun off many tech companiesafter incubation at the Lab.81The Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry atCarnegie Mellon Universityis a “laboratory foratypical, anti-disciplinary, and inter-institutional researchat the intersections of arts, science, technology, andculture.” The STUDIO provides paid artist residenciesand facilities and commissions work. It also provides itsfellows with access to human and technical resources atCarnegie Mellon and throughout the Pittsburgh regionand develops public venues for the presentation ofwork.82 Ideas42uses behavioral science to design scalablesolutions for social impact. The group educates policy-makers and practitioners on how to use behavioralscience and partners with institutions to evaluate andimprove existing models and create and test newsolutions. They are focused on using behavioral insightsto scale solutions.83 IDEOis a global design company that seeks to createpositive impact through design. IDEO is known for usingDesign Thinking, a process that reframes problems in ahuman-centric way and uses interdisciplinarycollaboration, empathy, and prototyping to designsolutions and test them with actual users.84IAM Lab and the Landscape of Arts and Science Collaboration 23The Need for a RigorousTranslation Approach We see in the efforts of other multidisciplinaryresearch centers much of what we hope toaccomplish at IAM Lab: bringing together scientistsand artists, focusing on research-to-practice, scalingand disseminating, aggregating funding, andcreating a repository of scholarly papers and otherresources for researchers. Still, expanding evidence-based practice and extending brain scienceapplications to the arts disciplines is an endeavor thatwarrants its own consideration. There is much to learn about the intricateintersections of the arts and our human brain.However, as previously discussed, the arts in generalare not known for scientific rigor or evidence-basedpractice, though specific disciplines such as musictherapy do benefit from a more rigorous researchapproach. While a strong body of research shows the power ofthe arts to affect a wide range of issues, the absenceof such rigor in most programs has limited its reachinto scientific fields. Researchers around the world are conducting studies inneuroaesthetics without a translational approach thatproperly validates the arts as interventions andsolutions.“You now appreciate the dilemma ANFA faces.There is evidence based on neuroscience animalresearch that a link should exist between theenvironment and human behavior, but due tolack of funding and the difficulty in pursingcontrolled studies, the data is not beingcollected (or cannot be interpreted when it is).” Correspondence with Steven Henriksen, Presidentof the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture.Despite broad interest, no American research programsfocus on neuroaesthetics. As a result, even thoughaesthetics influences many decisions, big and small,little of their psychological and neural underpinnings isknown. The few institutions that do touch onneuroaesthetics are not grounded in rigorous cognitiveneuroscience methods. Moreover, solutions are notborne out of interdisciplinary collaboration and rigorousempirical research to develop guiding scientificresearch principles that translate into policy andpractice. Therefore, the research on the impact of thearts is often anecdotal and underfunded with limitedevaluation and dissemination. While the arts need neuroscience, neuroscience alsoneeds the arts. “Neuroscience has served and continuesto serve as a descriptive tool used to shed light on theparts of the brain involved in decision-making, butcannot be used as a full-fledged predictive tool. In otherwords, while neuroscience techniques can explain howvarious parts of the brain interact during decision-making, and what that means, it has little predictivepower with regard to the course of action taken.”85 A consistent and rigorous approach to empiricalresearch and translation that brings together basicscience, cognitive neuroscience, and the arts would gofar to produce reliable, reputable, and replicablefindings for many disciplines. Beyond outcomes inhealth, wellbeing, and learning, a translationalapproach would build and formalize the field ofneuroaesthetics in important ways. By establishingcommon research questions, tools, methodologies,training, and dissemination practices, we couldcollectively build a repository of comparable data andexperienced researchers and practitioners from whichto draw insights and advance the field. This is a long-term approach that needs a place to start and grow. Finally, IAM Lab seeks to expand and extend thedefinition of neuroaesthetics to include a critical factormissing from current arts and mind research: impact. Aspreviously introduced, understanding the impact ofaesthetic experiences on the brain is more than a “niceto know” from a scientific perspective; it hastremendous implications for the health, wellbeing,quality of life, and academic and social success ofmillions of people. The Need for a Rigorous Translation Approach 27Next >