Is Auditory perception a learned process or innate?

[jkeny]

You are, in my opinion, an by definition, using it in an inaccurate sense that could lead you to the conclusion that removing that bias can only result in negative conclusions, and that's not true.

I don't follow you? I'm using it in the sense that it is always used on these forums - cognitive bias clouds your "true" perception of the sound. I don't understand what you are saying

You can expect to hear accurate reproduction and hear it, even when it is not there.

Huh? When the cognitive bias isn't there you can hear accurate reproduction - isn't that what all talk about cognitive bias says?

MLs are a perfect example in these discussion.

Sorry, I don't know what you are referring to with MLS?

 

[amirm]

The F. Toole book is filled with references of this "learning". Sometimes we "learn" how to ignore things - needed for the "suspension of the disbelief" .

In order to analyze this subject we must use an hierarchy to put some order in the debate - Toole refers to the Blesser and Salter (2007) perspective in his book, considering sensation, perception and meaning. From the Sound Reproduction

Sensation At the lowest level is , an indication that the organism reacts
to a sound—a detection threshold. This is probably quite well related to
physical measurements of the sound.

Perception The next level is , which incorporates cognitive processes
embracing cultural and personal experiences. Here we recognize what it
is that we heard, and perhaps initiate a process of adaptation. This
means that some features in measurements may be neutralized by
adaptation, and no longer be relevant.

Meaning At the highest level of response to sound, we attribute to the
recognition, and this can range from irrelevant to highly relevant, from
undesirable to good. Depending on the informational content of the
sound, we may choose to pay attention or to ignore it.

Thanks for posting this micro. This is super important as intuitively, we think what we hear is all about the first one. But it is not. Whether we can hear a 10 Khz tone by itself, is defined by #1. But that same tone, with a much louder 8 khz tone, will be inaudible. This triggers #2 (i.e. psychoacoustics/cognition). How a clock radio plays a guitar that we recognize as such despite severe fidelity issues, is #3. We recognize the sound of a guitar and lock into that image with smallests hints of what it is.

The cognitive part, especially when it comes to acoustics and sound reproduction, is very challenging for many as much of it is non-intuitive. It is through extensive studies that we know as much about it as we do. And unfortunately much of that is buried in research papers of ASA (Acoustic Society of America). Dr toole presents a summary of them but if you are not familiar with the topic, or appreciate the distinctions that micro quoted above, they make little sense. In that respect, I found the extensive references Dr. Toole provides in his book a goldmine. By snaking through them, and reading the original research, a much clearer picture emerges. And one that is quite fascinating. People much smarter than me may be able to intuit them but I find no substitute for extensive reading of all of that material to have a correct grasp of them.

Take the simple concept of reflections in the room. One may think, and it is routinely said so, that these "echoes" must make it hard to understand speech in movies and voices in music. Turns out this is not the case. That some amount of reflections is actually helpful in speech recognition. It is only when reverberations lasts more than the timing of Consonant-vowel (CV) that speech becomes impaired (i.e too live of a room). Even simpler is the fact that we do not hear these reflections as echos even though they clearly are. To become an echo, the reflection has to be so much stronger that it normally defined, as discovered by Haas. The shorter the time delay, the louder the reflection needs to be before we hear it distinctly and hence, perceive it as an echo.

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

I'm using it in the sense that it is typically used in audio forums - a cognitive bias interferes with the true/correct experience of a stimulus, therefore it can't be a bias towards truth or correctness it is always AWAY from this truthful or correct experience of the stimulus.

I'm saying this is wrong. I'm saying you could have a bias, based on reputation, specifications, whatever, to believe a given product is accurate. And it may actually be accurate. That doesn't change your bias.

isn't that what all talk about cognitive bias says? Sorry, I don't know what you are referring to with MLS?

I used the MLs as an example of a false positive as a result of bias. Many audiophiles describe them as transparent and revealing, yet the measurement in the Harman studies show that they are not accurate and those measurements are backed up by the listening tests. People like them, they look great, they are well respected, so in sighted listening they are perceived to be much more accurate, transparent, revealing...choose your modifier...than they are. A false positive.

Tim

 

[jkeny]

The F. Toole book is filled with references of this "learning". Sometimes we "learn" how to ignore things - needed for the "suspension of the disbelief" .

In order to analyze this subject we must use an hierarchy to put some order in the debate - Toole refers to the Blesser and Salter (2007) perspective in his book, considering sensation, perception and meaning. From the Sound Reproduction

Sensation At the lowest level is , an indication that the organism reacts
to a sound—a detection threshold. This is probably quite well related to
physical measurements of the sound.

Perception The next level is , which incorporates cognitive processes
embracing cultural and personal experiences. Here we recognize what it
is that we heard, and perhaps initiate a process of adaptation. This
means that some features in measurements may be neutralized by
adaptation, and no longer be relevant.

Meaning At the highest level of response to sound, we attribute to the
recognition, and this can range from irrelevant to highly relevant, from
undesirable to good. Depending on the informational content of the
sound, we may choose to pay attention or to ignore it.

Yes, defining that hierarchy is important to contextualise what is being discussed. I'm specifically talking about auditory perception - the part that makes sense of the sensation before any "personal" meaning is attached to these "recognised" sounds. Auditory scene analysis describes it pretty well - "This is understood as the process by which the human auditory system organizes sound into perceptually meaningful elements."

 

[jkeny]

Thanks for posting this micro. This is super important as intuitively, we think what we hear is all about the first one. But it is not. Whether we can hear a 10 Khz tone by itself, is defined by #1. But that same tone, with a much louder 8 khz tone, will be inaudible. This triggers #2 (i.e. psychoacoustics/cognition). How a clock radio plays a guitar that we recognize as such despite severe fidelity issues, is #3. We recognize the sound of a guitar and lock into that image with smallests hints of what it is.

This was part of the reason I started the thread - to get an idea of what people understood by auditory perception. It seems that there is a lot of debate about higher level aspects - the role of listening/reviewers Vs measurements but underlying this I wondered if people actually considered what is going on in auditory processing?

The cognitive part, especially when it comes to acoustics and sound reproduction, is very challenging for many as much of it is non-intuitive. It is through extensive studies that we know as much about it as we do. And unfortunately much of that is buried in research papers of ASA (Acoustic Society of America). Dr toole presents a summary of them but if you are not familiar with the topic, or appreciate the distinctions that micro quoted above, they make little sense. In that respect, I found the extensive references Dr. Toole provides in his book a goldmine. By snaking through them, and reading the original research, a much clearer picture emerges. And one that is quite fascinating. People much smarter than me may be able to intuit them but I find no substitute for extensive reading of all of that material to have a correct grasp of them.

Take the simple concept of reflections in the room. One may think, and it is routinely said so, that these "echoes" must make it hard to understand speech in movies and voices in music. Turns out this is not the case. That some amount of reflections is actually helpful in speech recognition. It is only when reverberations lasts more than the timing of Consonant-vowel (CV) that speech becomes impaired (i.e too live of a room). Even simpler is the fact that we do not hear these reflections as echos even though they clearly are. To become an echo, the reflection has to be so much stronger that it normally defined, as discovered by Haas. The shorter the time delay, the louder the reflection needs to be before we hear it distinctly and hence, perceive it as an echo.

I think you will find much more up-to-date & deeper research into this aspect by looking into David Griesinger's work on the role of reflections in intelligibility & presence/engagement where he details his findings of the rules determining if reflections are detrimental/enhancing to our auditory perception & his critique of current acoustic room measurements.

His Youtube channel is here in which a lot of his presentations are found

BTW, he criticises Toole & Floyd's premise regarding reflections at 40:49 on the first video of the Youtube channel

 

[jkeny]

I'm saying this is wrong. I'm saying you could have a bias, based on reputation, specifications, whatever, to believe a given product is accurate. And it may actually be accurate. That doesn't change your bias.

OK, but if we look at the Harmon graph - for all speakers, sighted preferences scored differently to unsighted preferences - I don't think that there was any report of a single speaker being scored by an individual identically in sighted Vs blind listening? Should your theory not apply here?

I used the MLs as an example of a false positive as a result of bias. Many audiophiles describe them as transparent and revealing, yet the measurement in the Harman studies show that they are not accurate and those measurements are backed up by the listening tests. People like them, they look great, they are well respected, so in sighted listening they are perceived to be much more accurate, transparent, revealing...choose your modifier...than they are. A false positive.

Tim

OK but my point above still applies - should we not see at least one test where blind & sighted score the same based on your premise of how a bias can work?

 

[amirm]

This was part of the reason I started the thread - to get an idea of what people understood by auditory perception. It seems that there is a lot of debate about higher level aspects - the role of listening/reviewers Vs measurements but underlying this I wondered if people actually considered what is going on in auditory processing?

I like to see research cited in such a discussion than sharing intuition. That is where the learning will come from.

[I think you will find much more up-to-date & deeper research into this aspect by looking into David Griesinger's work on the role of reflections in intelligibility & presence/engagement where he details his findings of the rules determining if reflections are detrimental/enhancing to our auditory perception & his critique of current acoustic room measurements.

His Youtube channel is here in which a lot of his presentations are found

I am quite familiar with David's work and what he is most famous for (Lexicon Logic 7 simulated surround). And have a lot of his papers, presentations, etc. He is not a reference for me as far as comprehensive view of modern acoustics but one of many sources of such info. I also watched one of the videos he has in there about speech and localization. Ironically, it has such poor recording, having used the camcorder mic from far away, that it was painful to watch and understand. His presentation was also very hurried which would make it hard for anyone to follow who is not studying the science. These aside, his first slide repeats what i said about excessive reflections making speech intelligibility hard. Did you cite him because you think he disagrees? If so, where?

 

[jkeny]

I like to see research cited in such a discussion than sharing intuition. That is where the learning will come from.

I find it useful to sample people's opinion on these matters as it gives an indication of what might be the underlying premises behind some of the things said in other threads elsewhere. So, irrespective of whether there is research cited or available, there is still some learning from such sharing.

I am quite familiar with David's work and what he is most famous for (Lexicon Logic 7 simulated surround). And have a lot of his papers, presentations, etc. He is not a reference for me as far as comprehensive view of modern acoustics but one of many sources of such info. I also watched one of the videos he has in there about speech and localization. Ironically, it has such poor recording, having used the camcorder mic from far away, that it was painful to watch and understand. His presentation was also very hurried which would make it hard for anyone to follow who is not studying the science. These aside, his first slide repeats what i said about excessive reflections making speech intelligibility hard. Did you cite him because you think he disagrees? If so, where?

Yes, I thought you were familiar with him but I don't know why you don't consider him a reference in his specific area of research? Care to elaborate?

I posted the links for readers to also become familiar with some other viewpoints (on specific aspects of acoustics) other than Toole/Floyd's viewpoint. I wasn't specifically disagreeing with what you said, just expanding it somewhat through the Griesinger links provided. Specifically, it's the relative energy of the direct sound to the reflective sound (within a specific timeframe) that is of consequence - hence better sound can be achieved in a number of ways - not just by decreasing the reflective energy at a particular seating position but also by increasing the direct sound energy i.e using more directive loudspeakers.

As I said some of Griesingers research is interesting & relevant to the whole Toole/Floyd/Harmon stuff as it concerns reflections & the perception of "presence" or what he used to call intelligibility. If you look at the first video on his channel "Early Reflections Vs Presence" (which has well recorded audio, btw) you will see some criticism of a premise of Toole (who Grisesinger worked with for years) & others - a mistake made in a lot of research is in "assuming that data from single reflection experiments apply to halls & rooms" And furthermore that most audio listening rooms suffer from excess reflective energy & therefore directivity speakers such as Quad, Magnaplanars & large horns can somewhat counteract this issue & help produce a more coherent sound.

This, to me, sounds more practical than the Harmon research which seems to me to avoid the practicalities of room interactions, stereo reproduction. In other words Toole/Harmon's graphs rely on the underlying premise (backed by some further research) that there is no change to speaker preferences when the speakers are used in stereo & placed in a room. Whereas, Griesinger's research & graphs show actual rooms & their measurements in situ but have a weakness in that there are no blind test results, AFAIK

 

[esldude]

This was part of the reason I started the thread - to get an idea of what people understood by auditory perception. It seems that there is a lot of debate about higher level aspects - the role of listening/reviewers Vs measurements but underlying this I wondered if people actually considered what is going on in auditory processing?

I think you will find much more up-to-date & deeper research into this aspect by looking into David Griesinger's work on the role of reflections in intelligibility & presence/engagement where he details his findings of the rules determining if reflections are detrimental/enhancing to our auditory perception & his critique of current acoustic room measurements.

His Youtube channel is here in which a lot of his presentations are found

BTW, he criticises Toole & Floyd's premise regarding reflections at 40:49 on the first video of the Youtube channel

Well, I once attended some lectures in a hall designed with diffusors and absorption. It was surprisingly dead. Listening to a lecture was a real chore. After a couple years of complaints they put these spaced ceramic covered panels down each sidewall. Covered maybe 1/3 of the surface. Listening to someone speak was so much easier after they did that.

Yes, just an anecdotal empirical experience. But someone working for them must have known what was needed to make lectures easy to hear and understand.

 

[jkeny]

Well, I once attended some lectures in a hall designed with diffusors and absorption. It was surprisingly dead. Listening to a lecture was a real chore. After a couple years of complaints they put these spaced ceramic covered panels down each sidewall. Covered maybe 1/3 of the surface. Listening to someone speak was so much easier after they did that.

Yes, just an anecdotal empirical experience. But someone working for them must have known what was needed to make lectures easy to hear and understand.

Why didn't they just take down some of the absorbers & diffusers rather than add reflectors? Sounds like someone knew the solution but decided to make more money out of the situation by adding rather than subtracting

 

[esldude]

Why didn't they just take down some of the absorbers & diffusers rather than add reflectors? Sounds like someone knew the solution but decided to make more money out of the situation by adding rather than subtracting

Don't know as I had no involvement beyond periodically hearing presentations there. My point was simply that some reflection in this case made spoken presentations and lectures easier to follow than relatively little reflection.

 

[rbbert]

Don't know as I had no involvement beyond periodically hearing presentations there. My point was simply that some reflection in this case made spoken presentations and lectures easier to follow than relatively little reflection.

I think that is fairly well known by acoustic consultants. Most typically recommend a mixture of absorption, diffusion and reflection with no more than 60% of surfaces devoted to any one of them, and it's often something like 25/25/50 (the 50 being reflective) or 30/30/40.

 

[amirm]

Yes, I thought you were familiar with him but I don't know why you don't consider him a reference in his specific area of research? Care to elaborate?

I posted the links for readers to also become familiar with some other viewpoints (on specific aspects of acoustics) other than Toole/Floyd's viewpoint. I wasn't specifically disagreeing with what you said, just expanding it somewhat through the Griesinger links provided. Specifically, it's the relative energy of the direct sound to the reflective sound (within a specific timeframe) that is of consequence - hence better sound can be achieved in a number of ways - not just by decreasing the reflective energy at a particular seating position but also by increasing the direct sound energy i.e using more directive loudspeakers.

As I said some of Griesingers research is interesting & relevant to the whole Toole/Floyd/Harmon stuff as it concerns reflections & the perception of "presence" or what he used to call intelligibility. If you look at the first video on his channel "Early Reflections Vs Presence" (which has well recorded audio, btw) you will see some criticism of a premise of Toole (who Grisesinger worked with for years) & others - a mistake made in a lot of research is in "assuming that data from single reflection experiments apply to halls & rooms" And furthermore that most audio listening rooms suffer from excess reflective energy & therefore directivity speakers such as Quad, Magnaplanars & large horns can somewhat counteract this issue & help produce a more coherent sound.

This, to me, sounds more practical than the Harmon research which seems to me to avoid the practicalities of room interactions, stereo reproduction. In other words Toole/Harmon's graphs rely on the underlying premise (backed by some further research) that there is no change to speaker preferences when the speakers are used in stereo & placed in a room. Whereas, Griesinger's research & graphs show actual rooms & their measurements in situ but have a weakness in that there are no blind test results, AFAIK

I watched that video. All but one slide is about acoustics of *large* spaces: classrooms (really lecture halls), concert halls, etc. That is a very, very different space. And acoustics rules very different. For example a reverberation of time of 2 to 3 seconds is very good for a large hall but dreadful for home listening space (0.25 to 0.6 is the range there).

The one slide that deals with small rooms, and says Dr. Toole is wrong is just opinions. No research is presented. No data is presented. He just disagrees. I don't know how you could have learned anything from that slide. In sharp contrast, if you read Dr. Toole's research, unlike the comments that David makes, it is full of such data. Here is one example graph that I had saved for a different conversation just to give an example:

This is the type of data that should be presented. Formal listening tests with cross correlation with other studies. Experimentations that he shares in his video are fine but they are not research points. THere is also text like this from Dr. Toole's book:

"Adding more to this perspective, Figure 8.2 shows a comparison of the IACC
generated by a single lateral reflection in an otherwise anechoic space (Ando,
1977) and two measurements of IACC in a listening room, one with the side
walls reflective and one with the side walls covered by absorbing material (Kishinaga
et al., 1979). The Ando IACC values were calculated using music excerpts,
whereas Kishinaga et al. used impulse responses; the values will not be exactly
comparable because of this. When stereo listening tests were done in the two
versions of the room, it was found that the condition with absorbing side walls
was preferred for monitoring of the recording process and examining audio
products, whereas reflective side walls (which reduced IACC) were preferred
when listeners were simply “enjoying the music.” As might be expected, reflective
side walls resulted in a “broadening of the sound image.” Adding absorption
to the front wall, behind the loudspeakers, reportedly improved image localization
and reduced coloration."

I don't know how you can say a video that is almost entirely about acoustics of large spaces, and with no references to any preference studies, is more practical than the above quote. We have references here. And perceptual experimental results directly reading on our situation, i.e. enjoying music.

Note that the answer is listener dependent. So David can very well have a personal preference, coming from recording side of things, that is the exception to the rule.

Once you become an expert in this field, sure, you want to read everything including work of David's. But I do not at all recommend that you venture there without a compass that points to due north in sea of acoustic information.

 

[jkeny]

Amir, I thought you were familiar with Griesinger's work? I only linked to his video because it had a specific reference to Olive & Toole's graph of "absolute thresholds for single lateral reflections (anechoic) using various signals" in which he, Griesinger, criticises this concept of absolute threshold. I actually agree with the thrust of his remarks in this slide & elsewhere - all too often simplistic scenarios, in this case singe reflections or signals such as clicks, tones or noise, are used in various auditory testing & claims about audibility thresholds made. Olive & Toole's (& others) is not beyond being analysed & criticised with or without data to back up any analysis or criticism - often common logic is enough to query a conclusion. So, I don't find Griesinger's criticism just opinion (even if I did, the opinion of an expert in the field should not be so easily dismissed as just opinion) - it's the based on a logical consideration of what's presented & a realistic statement that in the real world singe reflections do not occur.

As you know Giesinger has a number of earlier papers, slides & reports dealing with small listening rooms - I'm sure I don't need to remind you of that.

Finally, Amir, there is a wealth of measurements & graphs in Floyd & Toole's work but this doesn't make them sacrosanct or beyond criticism or analysis. I'm very grateful for all that you bring to this & other forums in the wealth of objective information that you have at hand but sometimes it's good to step back some from being too attached to the measurements & consider them from the perspective of others (I know that you mostly do this).

 

[amirm]

Amir, I thought you were familiar with Griesinger's work?

The work that is uniquely identified with him is simulated surround and digital reverb. Not in general area of acoustics.

I only linked to his video because it had a specific reference to Olive & Toole's graph of "absolute thresholds for single lateral reflections (anechoic) using various signals" in which he, Griesinger, criticises this concept of absolute threshold. I actually agree with the thrust of his remarks in this slide & elsewhere - all too often simplistic scenarios, in this case singe reflections or signals such as clicks, tones or noise, are used in various auditory testing & claims about audibility thresholds made. Olive & Toole's (& others) is not beyond being analysed & criticised with or without data to back up any analysis or criticism - often common logic is enough to query a conclusion.

I didn't hear him criticize Dr. Toole's work in that manner. He just said the threshold of one reflection is not the same as having 1000 of them. Well duh! 1000 of them will have far higher amplitude so no, it is not the same as one of them. Acoustic research absolutely relies on simpler signals to bookend detection thresholds as often they are far more sensitive than our sensitivity to music. And at any rate, with music we have to then wonder which track is representative of all music. Or even most music. Not easily done. But testing is also done there and the work does not at all stop at test signals. Here is one of many examples, showing at what point we either detect a reflection is there, or when we consider it distinct and hence a clear echo:

So you see both speech and music (Mozart) are used. 0 db means the reflection is as strong as the direct sound. For distances less than 30 feet (30 milliseconds travel time for the reflection), the reflection actually has to be stronger than the source of the sound to be heard as an echo. Unless you have a lens style circular room that focuses many reflections, this will not happen in our listening rooms since we rarely have a reflection that is 30+ feet long that has maintained a level as high as the direct sound. So right away we do away with our intuition that reflections are like echoes and hence "bad." They are simply not heard as echoes. When they do result in echos, we see that music is a less critical signal than speech.

At the other extreme, we have the absolute level below which we can't even hear there is a reflection. We see that the music in shorter reflection paths < 40 feet, is actually more revealing. The effect here being that of spaciousness, seems to be easier to detect in music than speech. The shape of the detection threshold is distinctly different too. We can probe further and see how that varies with different signals:

We see wildly different shapes now. The more smooth the signal, the flatter the shape. All of these test signals are necessary for us to get a total understanding of our auditory system.

So, I don't find Griesinger's criticism just opinion (even if I did, the opinion of an expert in the field should not be so easily dismissed as just opinion) - it's the based on a logical consideration of what's presented & a realistic statement that in the real world singe reflections do not occur.

I am not smart enough to intuit any of the above sampling of measurements and hundreds like this using logical reasoning. The logic only materializes after you see all the data, and stitch them together -- not an easy job at all. Note that the research data in Dr. Toole's book on this topic relies on perhaps 20% of his own, his team's work (see reference to Barron in Mozart data for example). There is considerable amount of research brought in, to show a consistent, and logical picture of our perception. It is not one man's work or opinion by any stretch although the work that he has done is certainly a cornerstone and recognized as such.

Finally, Amir, there is a wealth of measurements & graphs in Floyd & Toole's work but this doesn't make them sacrosanct or beyond criticism or analysis. I'm very grateful for all that you bring to this & other forums in the wealth of objective information that you have at hand but sometimes it's good to step back some from being too attached to the measurements & consider them from the perspective of others (I know that you mostly do this).

That is exactly what I have done. My views in sound acoustics (the general scientific domain) is based on considerable amount of research from every direction. As I mentioned, Dr. Toole's own book relies on huge number of other papers and studies just the same. I counted it once and I seem to recall he has 270 references in his book with maybe 20 of them his own. I probably have 200 papers that read on this topic in my library, all of which I have read and cross-correlated to others before I had my "aha moment" where all the pieces of the puzzle fit together. Reading Dr. Toole's book initially did not do it for me. I had to dig deep and read all the other research. In that sense, seeing one slide from David where he just puts down Dr. Toole's work but says nothing else, doesn't mean anything to me. I would need to see his references, look at those, and then determine if what he is saying is right.

The best advice I have is to NOT use your intuition about anything here. You need to erase everything you think is happening and read the research. Your intuition, logic, etc. is all wrong in absence of it.

 

[the sound of Tao]

Would it have been good to have had a third option, ie that audio perception is both innate and learned.

Innate constraints and potentials like the form relationship of the left and right cochlears which create significant difference in sensitivity to spatial location perception or hyperacousis or hyper sensitivity to specific frequencies can inform our early experience and can modify our experience of sound but also our audio perception can also modify and develop learning both consciously and unconsciously from our experiences beyond this.

 

[Tony Lauck]

I think you re playing fast & loose with the word bias - a bias is tendency towards some skew AWAY from the correct position - it's not a tendency towards the correct position - a bias is always wrong, no? What I am saying is that a low note played on a large instrument will sound deeper than the same note played on a smaller instrument due to our cognitive bias. Take away the sight of these instruments & the two note will sound the same. But in laying down our internal mapping we don't have to close our eyes to do so - we do so with all biasing intact & functioning in the real world. How does this not influence the internal map we all have created?

Again, you are using bias incorrectly - there is no such thing as a "reasonably correct bias" - a bias can only draw you away from the correct view. A bias is like a filter - which is more correct looking through a filter or looking without the filter? Which is more correct auditory perception without bias or with biasing factors?

Please explain what is meant by "the correct view".

Note that this is a serious question. There are epistemological issues and not just word definitions.

 

[jkeny]

Thanks, Amir for your detailed reply.
My interpretation of fig 6.14 is not about when a reflection is heard as an echo (this generally only happens above 80ms, I believe) but rather when it causes a shift in the sound towards the speaker creating the delayed sound (i.e simulating a reflection). It doesn't tell us if any changes in timbre are perceived & at what values? I just find this graph & the one referenced by Griesinger in his presentation somewhat misleading in calling these plots "thresholds" but I'm open to being wrong.

 

[jkeny]

Please explain what is meant by "the correct view".

Note that this is a serious question. There are epistemological issues and not just word definitions.

Yes, Tony, I knew this was a can of epistemological worms when I stated it as I did "correct view" but I wanted to reflect the view that a perception which is unsullied by cognitive bias is a "more correct" perception.

 

[KBK]

I'll duplicate a post of mine on the other thread.

One thing related to some of your comments is how we can adapt to inaccurate sound until we ignore it or even come to think it correct over time. So a question is if someone listening for years on inaccurate speakers they have grown used to would have the same preference as most other people? I believe many would answer no. Some research that might lead to one to think the answer instead is yes involved height and directional perception. Researchers tested people's perception of height in sound. Then inserted molds into the pinna to alter the shape which altered height perception. At first upon retesting height perception was erratic and inaccurate. After many hours of wearing the ear inserts the brain apparently learned how to process the new sound cues, and height perception improved. In more hours it eventually equalled the original perceptual accuracy. Things sounded 'normal' and perceptions were accurate despite the flawed input.

So when people buy and cater to speakers, how much of their performance is really fixed and how much is the owner's brain adapting?

Getting back to my original question about whether owners of inaccurate speakers will have the same preference in a Harman type comparison. Researchers removed the molds and retested. Unlike when molds were first inserted, everyone's perception was immediately correct and accurate. There was no period of hours learning it back the old way. That leads me to think even owners of inaccurate speakers would recognize and prefer results similar to everyone else. I know it isn't a direct fit, but it support the idea somewhat.

The test not performed is putting the molded inserts back into the ear a few days later if the testees would also immediately have accurate perception with that or whether another dozen hours would be needed to acclimate again. My guess, is the brain developed a new pattern along with the natural one, and would recognize the old inserts which would allow it to have accurate perception immediately without relearning. But it is only a guess.

There would still be a renormalization period, but it likely would not be as pronounced as the normalization time of the initial instance.

One can try this trick with traveling in cars.... and ear plugs. Put earplugs in,and then take them out. Playing with the time they are inserted vs the renormalization time after removal.