Aesthetic chills cause an emotional drift in valence and arousal

Chills are a peak emotional experience induced by stimuli such as music, films, and speeches. The emotional consequences of chills in terms of valence and arousal are still debated and the existing empirical data is conflicting. In this study, we tested the effects of ChillsDB, an open-source repository of chills-inducing stimuli, on the emotional ratings of 600+ participants. We found that chills have a positive effect on valence and arousal as participants experiencing chills reported a significantly greater valence and arousal after the experience than before, as compared to participants who did not experience chills. Furthermore, we found an interesting pattern in the valence ratings of participants, which tended to harmonize towards a similar mean after the experiment, though initially disparately distributed.