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JOURNAL OF ZHEJIANG UNIVERSITY  2024, Vol. 54 Issue (12): 104-114    DOI: 10.3785/j.issn.1008-942X.CN33-6000/C.2024.02.222
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Cognitive Neural Basis, Total Configuration and Modern Value of Aesthetic Need
Meng Fanjun
School of Humanities, Jilin University, Changchun130012, China

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Abstract  Aesthetic need is an essential concept in modern aesthetics, closely connected to aesthetic attitude and experience. Following the deconstruction of basic aesthetic categories such as aesthetic experience and attitude, a new trend in modern aesthetics is becoming increasingly evident. Researchers are focusing on and immersing themselves in the internal study of daily life phenomena, political phenomena, and artistic phenomena. This trend gradually weakens the scholarly interest in fundamental aesthetic issues and diminishes the ability of aesthetics as an interdisciplinary, holistic, and foundational theoretical discipline to reflect on, critique, and integrate specific aesthetic and artistic phenomena.In the history of aesthetics, Marxist aesthetics, Psychoanalytic aesthetics, Gestalt aesthetics, Humanistic aesthetics (Maslow’s hierarchy of needs), generative epistemological aesthetics, and evolutionary aesthetics have successively addressed the issue of aesthetic need. Contemporary Chinese scholars have also made contributions to the essential interpretation of aesthetic need from perspectives such as aesthetic psychology, cultural criticism, ecological culture, and life experience. From the perspective of the relationship between need and aesthetics, aesthetic need encompasses two levels: the aestheticization of general need and specific aesthetic need. In the process of semantic segmentation, the five dimensions of psychological actions, psychological states, psychological outcomes, interests, and non-interests in aesthetic need are closely related to classical aesthetic and psychological concepts. These concepts collectively form a semantic family centered on aesthetic need.Modern cognitive neuroaesthetics is rapidly developing, and researchers have explored the cognitive neural basis of aesthetic need from four aspects: neurons, neurotransmitters, functional brain areas, and neural mechanisms. The mixed motivation model for aesthetic need includes both biological and cultural aspects. Clarifying the neurobiological basis of aesthetic need and identifying the transformation and integration of biological and cultural drivers provide support for the holistic study of aesthetic need. Aesthetic need involves the integration of biological and cultural elements through the processes of objectification, embodiment, institutionalization, ecologicalization, and naturalization, thereby forming a holistic driving force structure.Based on the above analysis, the holistic theoretical configuration of aesthetic need includes neurons, neurotransmitters, functional brain regions, and neural processing mechanisms at the neurobiological level; “alienation and humanization” and “embodiment and empathy” at the individual physical and mental level; general customs and specific political systems at the social and cultural level; and human and natural environments at the ecological level. These four levels are integrated into a holistic theoretical framework for aesthetic need.In holistic thinking, reconstructing the theoretical form of aesthetic need helps to reconstruct the basic concepts of aesthetics and re-examine the real objects of current aesthetic cultural need. This will clarify the specific content of the contemporary aesthetic education and explore new paths to meet people’s realistic aesthetic need.
Key wordsaesthetic attitude      aesthetic need      cognitive-neural basis      holistic configuration      modern value     
Received: 22 February 2024     
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Meng Fanjun
Cite this article:   
Meng Fanjun. Cognitive Neural Basis, Total Configuration and Modern Value of Aesthetic Need[J]. JOURNAL OF ZHEJIANG UNIVERSITY, 2024, 54(12): 104-114.
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https://www.zjujournals.com/soc/EN/10.3785/j.issn.1008-942X.CN33-6000/C.2024.02.222     OR     https://www.zjujournals.com/soc/EN/Y2024/V54/I12/104
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