If I put happy or sad music under a close-up of a neutral face, will viewers read the face differently, and what should I check first?

One experiment tests exactly this: in Baranowski's study (30 students, thesis chapter and journal abstract), happy music made actors look happier and sad music less happy, with the effect strongest when the face itself was neutral; sad music did not make faces significantly sadder than no music. A different open study (Ansani et al. 2020) found music changed empathy and impressions of a character but not the overall attributed emotional state. No independent replication with a neutral face was found in the open sources checked. So music can be expected to push reading in its own direction, modestly, and the no-music version is the baseline to compare against. The sources do not say who owns the music used, so clearance is a separate step. Curator qualifications: The practical synthesis is supported by its two sources (C3R-0238, C3R-0240) and the multivariate effect sizes verify (.46 music vs .77 face). The 'strongest with a neutral face' point comes from a figure caption (visual reading), not a reported per-condition statistic. The face effect's degrees of freedom are printed F(4, 16) against F(4, 26) for music with the same N=30, another possible transcription slip alongside those in C3R-0238. Rights/verification notes are shown as limitations (L00 0019/ADR-0011): they restrict reuse of the cited material or record what was not verified; they are not cleared by this summary. Limitations: [component_reuse_restriction] Music rights unstated; clearance separate (producer). Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.

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