Enacting Moving Images Film Theory and Experimental Science within a New Cognitive Media Theory

This article highlights ways to relate psychology, neuroscience, and film theory that are underrepresented in the current debate and that could contribute to a new cognitive media theory. First, we outline how neuroscientific approaches to moving images could be embedded in the embodied, enactive cognition framework and recent predictive processing theories of the brain. Within this framework, we understand filmic engagement as a specific way of worldmaking which is co-constituted by formal elements such as framing, camerawork, and editing. Second, we address experimental progress. Here we weigh the promises and perils of neuroscientific studies by discussing the motor neuron account to camera movements as an example. Based on the limitations we identify, we advocate for a multi-method study of film experience that brings cognitive science into dialogue with philosophical accounts and qualitative in-depth explorations of subjective experience.

Automated summary

This article discusses the underrepresented ways of integrating psychology, neuroscience, and film theory in the current debate and their potential contribution to a new cognitive media theory. It outlines how neuroscientific approaches can be embedded in the embodied, enactive cognition framework and recent predictive processing theories of the brain. Furthermore, it addresses the promises and limitations of neuroscientific studies through an example of the motor neuron account to camera movements, advocating for a multi-method study of film experience that combines cognitive science with philosophical accounts and qualitative explorations of subjective experience.