A view worth talking about: The influence of social interaction on aesthetic experience and well-being outcomes in the gallery.

Art museums are inherently social spaces, and social interaction is a key element of arts-based health interventions. Despite this, the effects of viewing art in social contexts remain largely unexplored in empirical aesthetics. This research presents the first experimental, large-scale study to systematically investigate how social interactions, especially through meaningful conversation, influence aesthetic experience and well-being. Conducted within a special exhibition space at Manchester Art Gallery, this experiment employed a between-participant design in which visitors (N = 240) were randomly assigned to either an Individual viewing condition, a Synchronized silent group viewing condition, or a Discussion-based group viewing condition. Participants viewed two paintings for 10 minutes each while listening to a series of slow-looking prompts. While we observed overall increases in well-being markers such as valence, positive affect, and social connectedness, there were notable group differences as well. Namely, the Discussion group reported higher scores in various aesthetic experience outcomes as compared to the Synchronized group, although the Individual group also reported higher emotional engagement and gallery experience ratings as compared to Synchronized participants. However, only participants in the Discussion group exhibited significant well-being impacts, reporting increased positive affect, social connectedness, and group closeness relative to the Synchronized group. This study highlights the potential for integrating discussion-based art viewing into gallery programming to deepen art engagement and promote visitor well-being, offering valuable insights for museum curators and educators.