Pleasantness in Bodily Experience: A Phenomenological Inquiry

Marco C Rozendaal, Hendrik N.J. Schifferstein

This study investigated the varieties of pleasantness in bodily experience in order to advance the aesthetics of interaction paradigm. Interviews were held with twelve people varying in age and occupation. They were asked to describe pleasant experiences for Sight, Audition, Smell, Taste, Touch, Action and Thought. A phenomenological reduction performed on the interview transcripts resulted in seven pleasantness themes: sociality, aesthetics, comfort, agency, associations, vitality and progression. These pleasantness themes involved multiple bodily faculties with a prominence of two or three specific ones, which allowed a preliminary mapping of the pleasantness themes in relation to the body. The results may advance the aesthetics of interaction paradigm by explicating the varieties in pleasant experience and how the body is involved in shaping them.