13 replies to this topic

[Whatmore]

Interesting study where a bunch of violinists failed to pick or prefer a Stradivarius
http://blogs.discove...s-and-new-ones/

I wonder if we can learn anything from this in our hobby....

[Grumpy]

I remember seeing the Documentary about this and I posted about it at the time (a couple of years a go or was it about a year a go?) Really interesting, but do we dare mention 'blind testing' here?

[Drizt]

So wish we could, it is just common sence,

[GregWormald]

Interesting study where a bunch of violinists failed to pick or prefer a Stradivarius
http://blogs.discove...s-and-new-ones/

I wonder if we can learn anything from this in our hobby....

I learned that the price of one of the cheap violins ($100,000!) would buy me a great new stereo.

Greg

[tbag]

I remember seeing the Documentary about this and I posted about it at the time (a couple of years a go or was it about a year a go?) Really interesting, but do we dare mention 'blind testing' here?

what was the documentary?

[Ando]

We might be able to learn something relevant to our hobby from these three articles as well :
http://www.princeton...1/0212/7b.shtml
http://www.economics...s/orchestra.pdf
http://www.osborne-c...posts/blind.htm
Cheers Mike

[Grumpy]

what was the documentary?

Too long a go to remember . Not sure if a search here on SNA could find my postings about it (it might have been on the AVL forum?).

[Grumpy]

Ah here is my thread
http://www.stereo.ne...olin blind test

[hired goon]

G'day,

I recall a Penn & Teller: Bull****! episode on the telly one time where people where given different bottles of water, one labelled "pure spring water" and one labelled "tap water", and the majority of testers preferred the taste of the "pure spring water" bottle, even though all bottles were filled with ordinary tap water. That's just anecdote rather than data, but it's also why medical trials always account for the placebo effect.

There's also this study, where subjects where asked to rate different bottles of wine, labelled at $5/bottle to $90/bottle, but in reality each bottle had the same contents. As expected (and I hope I'm not introducing any bias here!), the subjects preferred the "expensive" wines in general. But the interesting thing in this study is that the part of the brain that experiences pleasure was more active when the subject was tasting the "expensive" wines, so that the subject's experience (in the brain) was affected by the expectation. The subjects really did prefer the "expensive" wine (rather than simply assert as much), because the brain had modified the processing in expectation.

One could make the obvious corollary to the world of audio, perhaps?

--Geoff

Edited by hired goon, 08 January 2012 - 06:25 AM.

[JA]

Interesting study where a bunch of violinists failed to pick or prefer a Stradivarius
http://blogs.discove...s-and-new-ones/

I wonder if we can learn anything from this in our hobby....

Thanks for posting W. That was an intersting read. It's a remarkable result, my only constructive criticism is that they should have made the test even more simple with some control, for instance:

Stradivarius O1 versus The New Violin N1 - tested by the same 21 violinists they used
Stradivarius O1 versus Stradivarius O1 - tested by the same 21 violinists they used
The New Violin N1 versus The New Violin N1 - tested by the same 21 violinists they used

for an even more confronting result

Best
JA

Edited by JA, 08 January 2012 - 07:45 AM.

[LogicprObe]

I remember seeing the Documentary about this and I posted about it at the time (a couple of years a go or was it about a year a go?) Really interesting, but do we dare mention 'blind testing' here?

I can't understand why it is taboo.

[Grumpy]

I can't understand why it is taboo.

Me either! but it has a way of running out of control around here for some reason and with your question and my answer it probably will again:thumb:
Hope it doesn't though

[Tony M]

I guess that's part of the reason I'm skeptical about what my own ears tell me. If I insert a $3.5K PS Perfectwave DAC in lieu of the $10 DAC built into the Sonos, it's a fair bet I'll hear that the PS DAC sounds better. I really need to know how much of this is expectation bias and how much is real to know if it's a worthwhile upgrade. Easier said than done, unfortunately.

However, if the result of a listening comparison goes in the opposite direction to expectations, it can be quite powerful. My son, who loves music, has a genuine interest in hifi and has a good ear hasn't been blown away by my Gales on the few occasions that he's listened to them. Now that we know that they were wired incorrectly, that isn't all that surprising. What remains surprising to me is the fact that what they did well was enough to compensate for the bass deficiencies in my estimation, at least.

Anyway, I had the new wooden Gales set up in the shed and got him to have a serious listen. He was quite impressed with the improvement, but still not overwhelmingly enthusiastic. So, I swapped speakers to the Klipsch RF-7's that he has liked since his early teenage years and that I'm keeping for him. His expectation was that the Klipsches would sound better. The opposite was absolutely, overwhelmingly true.

The track being played at the time was the acoustic version of Jackson Browne's "The Birds of St Marks". The verdict was the piano sounded solid and real on the Gales, but thin and "jangly" on the Klipsches. The timbre was clearly all wrong by comparison. Similarly, the vocals were natural, real and rounded on the Gales and definitely not so on the Klipsches. However, listened to in isolation, those deficiencies of the Klipsches have never been so apparent - their dynamics, efficiency and some other good qualities have tended to compensate.

Even Mrs M, who's not into audio, but was doing some ironing in the same room while this was going on, was surprised that the difference was apparent to her, too. "Well, I guess you'd better get some Gales for him", was her comment.

So, I tend to agree with the "No need for a DBT" crew when the oucome of a listening comparison is the opposite to expectations.

[LogicprObe]

Me either! but it has a way of running out of control around here for some reason and with your question and my answer it probably will again:thumb:
Hope it doesn't though

I dunno.........a bit of excitement doesn't go astray, I reckon.