The influence of sensory modalities and background information on the vividness of Li Bai's classical poetry

Previous studies have found that the vividness of imagery evoked during poetry reading may be the most significant influencing factor in poetic aesthetics. Specifically, "vividness refers to the internal clarity, distinctiveness, and intensity of an experience. In poetry, this experience is shaped by sensory modalities, which. refer to the ways in which humans process information through the five main senses: visual, audio, smell, touch, and taste. These sensory inputs are perceived as psychological representations. Additionally, this process is influenced by background information, which shapes the reader's perception and interpretation", To investigate the impact of the above factors on the vividness of poetry, using five Li Bai's poems (Li Bai, a famous poet in ancient China), this study designed five single-factor repeated-measures experiments to manipulate sensory modalities (visual, auditory, and visual-auditory) and background information (background image and background music). The results showed that readers experienced significantly higher vividness in the visual and visual-auditory modalities compared to the auditory modality, background information plays a positive role in enhancing the vividness of poetry and the interaction between sensory modalities and background information further amplifies the vividness of the poetic experience. By providing empirical data, this study addresses the limited comparisons among different sensory modalities and explores the interaction effects of sensory modalities and background information on poetry perception.