👁️ Why We Should All Embrace Slow-Looking

New research shows that slower processing and extended engagement produce more beauty and compassion in life

The world around us seems to move a little faster each day. Videos on social media get shorter and more intense, reading material gets more summarized, and people are less patient than ever about the delivery times for their packages. It’s no wonder that some of us worry about the state of our attention spans and impulsive tendencies.

Some areas of life and culture are not built for speed, but that doesn’t stop us rushing. Take museums and art galleries for example. They’re typically not designed for people who are short on time, and yet, research in 2017 showed that visitors at my favorite art gallery—The Art Institute of Chicago—spend only 29 seconds looking at an artwork on average. That’s barely enough time to read the plaque, let alone contemplate the art itself.

I’d forgive you for dismissing me as a disgruntled, aging millennial, but what if we really are missing something with our increasingly frenetic view of the world? What if spending more time—real, structured time—observing the world around us could radically deepen our emotional and intellectual experience?

One new study suggests just that: deliberately introducing more “slow-looking” into our lives may enhance how we feel and how we appreciate the beauty around us.

🧪 What did the researchers do?

In a 2025 study conducted at the Penn Museum, researchers recruited 34 participants and asked them to evaluate four art objects from African and Native American collections. The researchers randomly assigned two artworks per person to a “free exploration” condition and the other two to a structured “slow-looking” condition.

• In the free exploration condition, participants viewed objects as they typically would in a museum—without time constraints or specific prompts.

• In the slow-looking condition, participants were guided through three timed stages totaling 15 minutes per object, based on the Aesthetic Triad concepts in neuroaesthetics:

  1. Sensory-motor concept (5 min): focus on shapes, colors, patterns, dynamism, and textures

  2. Emotion-valuation concept (5 min): reflect on personal feelings that arise during viewing

  3. Meaning-knowledge concept (5 min): imagine the object’s cultural history and personal relevance

After viewing each object, participants completed detailed questionnaires assessing their emotional and cognitive reactions using a taxonomy of 11 dimensions across four broad categories: positive affect (e.g. compassion, calm), negative affect (e.g. sadness, anger), immersion (e.g. enraptured, fascinated), and epistemic transformation (e.g. inspired, enlightened).

Researchers also measured perceived beauty, liking, and understanding, while controlling for individual differences like age, education, artistic experience, and openness to experience.

🧠 What did the research find?

The results showed that slow-looking meaningfully changed the way people experienced art.

People experienced significantly more beauty and compassion in the slow-looking condition compared to free exploration condition. They also reported feeling more enraptured and edified by the art. So the benefits stretched across multiple levels of human psychology: people found more beauty in the art, they felt more emotionally connected with what they were seeing, and they ultimately felt more transformed by what they saw.

Slow-looking didn’t significantly impact more basic feelings such as pleasure, calm, or interest, and it also didn’t elevate any negative feelings like anger, frustration, or difficulty. The extra effort people put into viewing individual artworks returned higher-level feelings of emotional satisfaction without any obvious downsides.

Giving people time and structure to truly “see” an artwork encourages them to take deeper steps into it. As they emotionally immerse themselves, they open doors to potentially transformative experiences linked with beauty, compassion, and meaning. And there’s no reason to think the benefits of slow-looking are restricted to art. Whether walking through nature, connecting with family and friends, or just enjoying a meal, think of it as an opportunity to slow down and look more carefully.

⭐️ Takeaway tips

#1. Utilize the aesthetic triad framework during novel experiences

• Whether you’re looking at art or noticing other interesting structures or artifacts in your environment, explore whether the aesthetic triad method could help you gain a deeper appreciation and understanding of what’s in front of you:

  • 1) Start by noticing interesting visual details

  • 2) Explore your emotional responses

  • 3) Reflect on what the object represents culturally, historically, or personally

#2. Try slow-looking next time you visit a museum

• Plan your next visit to a museum or gallery with care so you don’t have to rush. Allow yourself to spend 10-15 minutes with individual pieces of art that capture your attention, so that you have time to immerse yourself more deeply or utilize the aesthetic triad framework. There’s no need to spend 15 minutes looking at every possible artwork in a museum; with 300,000 artworks at the Art Institute of Chicago, that would take almost a decade. But as you navigate an interesting space, be open and perceptive about the artifacts you’re passing, and when something speaks to you, just stop and look.

#3. What else can you do slowly?

• The research above promotes the benefits of slow-looking, but other aspects of our lives could do with slowing down too. Slow-walking, slow-eating, and slow-thinking can all give us the opportunity to savor our daily experiences rather than merely skimming them. Instead of rushing through lunch, hustling down Main Street, and reacting impulsively to everything you read or hear, intentionally slow your roll for more consciousness and less automaticity.

“All explorers are seeking something they have lost. It is seldom that they find it, and more seldom still that the attainment brings them greater happiness than the quest.”

~ Arthur C. Clarke

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