The object of perception in impacted sound sources: the role of perceptual accessibility and information accuracy

Giordano, B.L., McAdams, S. and Rocchesso, D. (2007) The object of perception in impacted sound sources: the role of perceptual accessibility and information accuracy. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 121(5), p. 3166.

Abstract

Two independent principles could potentially govern integration of information in the perception of a sound source. First, higher perceptual weights should be given to acoustical parameters that specify accurately and unambiguously a sound source property. Second, lower perceptual weights should be given to acoustical parameters related to less perceptually accessible information (e.g., impaired discrimination). The relevance of these principles to source perception was investigated. Hardness perception was investigated for the two objects whose interaction generates an impact sound: a highly damped hammer and a freely vibrating sounding object. Acoustical analyses identified unambiguous and relatively accurate acoustical specifiers of the impacted sound source. A first experiment assessed the ability of a listener to learn to discriminate hammer or sounding object hardness, providing a measure of the perceptual accessibility of the two source properties. A second experiment investigated hardness estimation in trained and untrained listeners, providing quantification of the relative perceptual relevance of the informational sources. A final experiment conducted on simulated sound sources further characterized weighting profiles in untrained listeners, decorrelating otherwise covarying source properties. Results concerning both mechanical and acoustical correlates suggest a relevance of both principles.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Giordano, Dr Bruno
• Authors: Giordano, B.L., McAdams, S., and Rocchesso, D.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Psychology & Neuroscience
• Journal Name: Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
• ISSN: 0001-4966