Using a Drift Diffusion Model to Validate the Quantification of Style Prototypicality as Assessed by the Viewers of Paintings

Abstract

When appreciating a painting, people often classify it into a style. The extent to which the painting is regarded as a typical example of the style is called the style prototypicality. The authors propose a method of quantifying style prototypicalities and experimentally validate this method using the drift rate parameter of the drift diffusion model. This parameter is calculated from participants’ decision-making response times. The authors find a positive correlation (r = .88, p < .001) between the drift rates and the quantified prototypicalities for the paintings used in this study, confirming the psychological appropriateness of the proposed quantification method.