Registered Report: How does art impact pain and stress? Exposure to multimodal art (Music + Visual) and music alone enhances pain tolerance more than visual art, but neither art form impacts autonomic or endocrine markers
Anna Fekete, Rosa M Maidhof, Eva Specker, Andreas Gartus, Urs M Nater, Helmut Leder · 2026
Read Registered Report: How does art impact pain and stress? Exposure to multimodal art (Music + Visual) and music alone enhances pain tolerance more than visual art, but neither art form impacts autonomic or endocrine markers by Anna Fekete, Rosa M Maidhof, Eva Specker, Andreas Gartus, Urs M Nater, Helmut Leder (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/plos-pone-0334060.txt.
Description
Anna Fekete and colleagues ran a registered experiment on whether art can dull pain. Forty-two women brought artworks and music they found deeply beautiful to the laboratory, then kept a hand in ice water while experiencing music alone, visual art alone, both together, or neither. The team measured how long participants tolerated the cold, plus stress hormones, heart signals, and self-reports.
Music and the combined experience let women endure the ice water far longer than visual art alone. Yet no art form changed measured stress in the body, and people who easily lose themselves in experiences benefited most. The authors conclude art's pain relief works mainly through absorption and attention, not body chemistry.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Anna Fekete, Rosa M Maidhof, Eva Specker, Andreas Gartus, Urs M Nater, Helmut Leder |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 97651 |
| LICENSE | CC_BY |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | PLOS |