Schedule of Events | Symposia

Delta-frequency EEG synchrony tracks shared audience engagement with live dance performances.

Poster Session D - Monday, March 31, 2025, 8:00 – 10:00 am EDT, Back Bay Ballroom/Republic Ballroom
Also presenting in Data Blitz Session 3 - Saturday, March 29, 2025, 10:30 am – 12:00 pm EDT, Constitution A.

Laura Rai¹ (laura.rai@ucl.ac.uk), Haeeun Lee², Emma Becke³, Carlos Trenado³, Sonia Abad-Hernando², Matthias Sperling^4,5, Diego Vidaurre⁶, Melanie Wald-Fuhrmann³, Daniel C Richardson⁷, Jamie A Ward⁸, Guido Orgs^1,2,3; ¹Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, Alexandra House, 17 Queen Square, London, UK, ²Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, Lewisham Way, New Cross, London, UK, ³Department of Music, Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, ⁴Independent Artist & Choreographer, London, UK, ⁵Siobhan Davies Studios, 85 St George's Rd, SE1 6ER London, UK, ⁶Department of Clinical Medicine - Center of Functionally Integrative Neuroscience, Aarhus University, Denmark, ⁷Department of Experimental Psychology, University College London, ⁸Department of Computing, Goldsmiths, University of London, Lewisham Way, New Cross, London, UK

Evolutionary theories claim that the performing arts – dance, music and theatre – transmit culture though live social interactions between groups of people. Yet, neuroscientific studies of these inherently social art forms are almost exclusively conducted on individual people watching video or sound recordings alone in a laboratory. Across three live dance performances, we simultaneously measured real-time dynamics between the brains of large audience groups of up to 23 members using mobile wet-electrode EEG (N = 69). We computed inter-subject correlations and phase lag values between the EEG of audience members relative to an active resting-state baseline. In a separate study (N = 28), individuals watched a recorded video of the performance alone in a laboratory condition. Interpersonal neural synchrony (INS) in the delta band (1-4 Hz) varied systematically with the dancers’ movements and the audiences’ collective engagement as predicted by the choreographer. INS was reduced when people watched a video of the performance on their own in a laboratory. Choreographic sections with higher INS were also rated as more engaging by an independent sample of viewers. Our study shows that live experiences are measurable as dynamic brain synchrony between co-present spectators and reflects artistically directed engagement with a live dance performance.

Topic Area: EMOTION & SOCIAL: Other