Do we hear size or sound? Balls dropped on plates

Abstract

The aim of this study is to examine whether it is possible to recover directly the size of an object from the sound of an impact. Specifically, the study is designed to investigate whether listeners can tell the size of a ball from the sound when it is dropped on plates of different diameters (on one, two, or three plates in Experiments 1, 2, and 3, respectively). In this paradigm, most of the sound produced is from the plate rather than the ball. Listeners were told neither how many different balls or plates were used nor the materials of the balls and plates. Although listeners provided reasonable ball size estimates, their judgments were influenced by the size of the plate: Balls were judged to be larger when dropped on larger plates. Moreover, listeners were generally unable to recognize either ball and plate materials or the number of plates used in Experiments 2 and 3. Finally, various acoustic properties of the sounds are shown to be correlated with listeners' judgments.

When a bang makes you run away: Spatial avoidance of threatening environmental sounds

“…Admittedly, processing sounds in this situation is different from processing sounds occurring in the real world. Some experiments were run in realistic conditions [13,25], but this was impossible here given the large diversity of the sounds we used. Using loudspeakers provides a rough approach to realistic conditions.…”

The subjective duration of ramped and damped sounds

“…Although pairs of such sounds have identical overall spectral contents, durations, levels, and absolute changes in level, many perceptual attributes of the sounds are strikingly different. Ramped and damped sounds differ in timbre (Akeroyd & Patterson, 1995;Irino & Patterson, 1996;Patterson, 1994aPatterson, , 1994b, subjective duration (Schlauch, Ries, & DiGiovanni, 2001), overall loudness (Stecker & Hafter, 2000), and possibly changes in loudness (for durations shorter than ~2 sec, see Neuhoff, 1998Neuhoff, , 2001Seifritz et al, 2002; for longer durations, see Canévet, 1986;Canévet & Scharf, 1990;Canévet, Teghtsoonian, & Teghtsoonian, 2003;Schlauch, 1992;Teghtsoonian, Teghtsoonian, & Canévet, 2000, 2005. The explanation for these effects is not yet clear, with differences in sensory coding providing a possible explanation for brief sounds but not for longer ones.…”

Integration of acoustical information in the perception of impacted sound sources: The role of information accuracy and exploitability.

“…Perception of the material of impacted objects is influenced by the decay of a sound (Avanzini & Rocchesso, 2001;Giordano & McAdams, 2006;Klatzky, Pai, & Krotkov, 2000;Lutfi & Oh, 1997;Roussarie, 1999) and by its frequency (Avanzini & Rocchesso, 2001;Giordano & McAdams, 2006;Klatzky et al, 2000). Estimation of the hardness and size of a striking object relies on loudness-and brightness-related information (Freed, 1990;Grassi, 2005). The gender of a clapper and of a walker is identified using rate and spectral shape information (Li, Logan, & Pastore, 1991;Repp, 1987).…”