Abstract: The fluency theory of aesthetic pleasure holds that the ease of processing can induce positive emotions and thus promote positive stimulus evaluation. However, serious conceptual and empirical challenges have emerged since these ideas were proposed 20 years ago. By incorporating insights from predictive processing frameworks (PPF) and the epistemic motivation model (EMM), it is expected to revise and update the original hedonic fluency theory into a multi-model integrated fluency interpretation framework for aesthetic judgment. It highlights the role of four factors in shaping aesthetic judgments: expectations of stimulus, expectations of fluency itself, non-directional epistemic goals associated with fluency and certainty, as well as specific directional epistemic goals. All these four factors change how fluency involves in aesthetic judgements and what specific impact it has. This framework not only provides theoretical support to better explain the paradoxical and complex fluency effects in the process of aesthetic judgment, but also points out the direction for future empirical research in this field.

Key words: aesthetic judgement, processing fluency, expectation, predictive processing, epistemic goals