Does the art you enjoy match your personality?

Try the survey at

http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/art/

If you like a party, you may prefer abstract paintings. The results of our online experiment into art preference and personality type suggest that extraverts prefer works by artists who don't attempt to paint reality.

Dr Stian Reimers designed the experiment to look at whether people with different personality types like different forms of art. In previous studies researchers have found that:



People who prefer abstract art tend to be more conservative, dogmatic, and are often sensation seekers.
People who are open to new experiences are less likely to enjoy looking at realistic paintings. They seek something more atypical and challenging.
People with low emotional stability tend to prefer abstract and pop-art paintings.
People who score high in agreeableness like paintings and tend to dislike forms like pop-art.
People who like representational paintings may also be more conscientious than average.

The painting with the lowest rating in the experiment. It's less clear how extraversion ties in with painting preference. Some researchers have found that extraverts like modern art more than introverts, but others have found exactly the opposite pattern.

Overall, there has been a lot of research about personality and art preference. In many cases the jury is still out on exactly how personality affects preference. One of the aims of the experiment was to directly address some of the most controversial issues.

The experiment

Researchers chose six distinct painting styles for the experiment:

Impressionism
Abstract
Japanese art
Islamic art
Northern Renaissance
Cubism.


In the first part of the experiment, test-takers were asked to rate the paintings and the artists. They were also asked to write words that described how the paintings made them feel.

In the second part they were asked to take a personality test, which incorporates a set of personality traits– the Five Factor model. It measures the following:

extraversion
agreeableness
conscientiousness
emotional stability
intellectualism.

This is one of the most popular forms of personality profile, partly because the different factors are largely independent of each other. For example, looking at a person's score on agreeableness shouldn't tell you anything about how they'll score on extraversion.

In addition to the five-factor model traits, psychologists also used a short set of questions measuring emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is more controversial than the other traits, but some researchers believe that people with higher emotional intelligence have a greater insight into people's feelings and drives, including their own. In short, people with high emotional intelligence are the sorts of people we might expect to engage with the subtle complexities of art.