Logo
ScienceStack
Table of Contents
Fetching ...
Sign In

Non-verbal Perception of Room Acoustics using Multi Dimensional Scaling Metho

Leonie Böhlke, Tim Ziemer, Rolf Bader

TL;DR

This work introduces a non-verbal, MDS-based framework to characterize subjective room acoustics by correlating perceptual proximities of music convolved with binaural room impulse responses to a broad set of acoustic and psychoacoustic parameters. The analysis finds that subjective room perception spans four to six dimensions, with echo density $E$ and fractal correlation dimension $D$ explaining the first two dimensions, and roughness $R$, loudness $N$, and early decay time $EDT$ shaping subsequent axes. The study argues that this non-verbal approach avoids biases from semantic adjectives and bipolar scales, and highlights the limited role of conventional RT measures like $RT_{20}$ and $RT_{30}$ in predicting perceptual space. It suggests that non-verbal, data-driven representations provide a richer, more robust mapping between objective room acoustics and listener experience, warranting replication across venues and stimuli.

Abstract

Subjective room acoustics impressions play an important role for the performance and reception of music in concert venues and auralizations. Therefore, room acoustics since the 20th century dealt with the relationship between objective, acoustic parameters and subjective impressions of room acoustics. One common approach is to correlate acoustic measures with experts' subjective ratings of rooms as recalled from their long-term memory, and explain them using acoustical measures. Another approach is to let listeners rate auralized room acoustics on bipolar scales and find objective correlates. In this study, we present an alternative approach to characterizing the subjective impressions of room acoustics. We concolve music with binaural room impulse response measurements and utilize Multi Dimensional Scaling (MDS) to identify the perceptual dimensions of room acoustics. Results show that the perception of room acoustics has $5$ dimensions that can be explained by the (psycho-)acoustical measures echo density, fractal correlation dimension, roughness, loudness, and early decay time.

Non-verbal Perception of Room Acoustics using Multi Dimensional Scaling Metho

TL;DR

This work introduces a non-verbal, MDS-based framework to characterize subjective room acoustics by correlating perceptual proximities of music convolved with binaural room impulse responses to a broad set of acoustic and psychoacoustic parameters. The analysis finds that subjective room perception spans four to six dimensions, with echo density and fractal correlation dimension explaining the first two dimensions, and roughness , loudness , and early decay time shaping subsequent axes. The study argues that this non-verbal approach avoids biases from semantic adjectives and bipolar scales, and highlights the limited role of conventional RT measures like and in predicting perceptual space. It suggests that non-verbal, data-driven representations provide a richer, more robust mapping between objective room acoustics and listener experience, warranting replication across venues and stimuli.

Abstract

Subjective room acoustics impressions play an important role for the performance and reception of music in concert venues and auralizations. Therefore, room acoustics since the 20th century dealt with the relationship between objective, acoustic parameters and subjective impressions of room acoustics. One common approach is to correlate acoustic measures with experts' subjective ratings of rooms as recalled from their long-term memory, and explain them using acoustical measures. Another approach is to let listeners rate auralized room acoustics on bipolar scales and find objective correlates. In this study, we present an alternative approach to characterizing the subjective impressions of room acoustics. We concolve music with binaural room impulse response measurements and utilize Multi Dimensional Scaling (MDS) to identify the perceptual dimensions of room acoustics. Results show that the perception of room acoustics has dimensions that can be explained by the (psycho-)acoustical measures echo density, fractal correlation dimension, roughness, loudness, and early decay time.

Paper Structure

This paper contains 30 sections, 16 equations, 6 figures, 4 tables.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Method
  3. Room Impulse Responses
  4. Preparation of Stimuli
  5. Multidimensional Scaling (MDS) Listening Experiment
  6. Test conditions and subjects
  7. Acoustic and Psychoacoustic Parameters
  8. Spectral Centroid ($C$)
  9. Roughness ($R$)
  10. Sharpness ($S$)
  11. Loudness ($L$)
  12. Fluctuation Strength ($F$)
  13. Tonality ($T$)
  14. Reverberation Time (RT)
  15. Early Decay Time (EDT)
  16. ...and 15 more sections

Figures (6)

  • Figure 1: Room Impulse Response (IR) measurement setup, using an alarm pistol, shot on a music venue stage.
  • Figure 2: Stress 1 and RSQ for MDS embedding dimensions $1$ to $6$.
  • Figure 3: Correlation Matrix of the MDS dimensions with the psychoacoustic parameters for 4-, 5-, and 6-dimensional MDS embeddings.
  • Figure 4: Loudness (left) and tonality (right) over dimension $4$ in the 5 dimensional MDS. Tonality is in much better agreement.
  • Figure 5: Loudness over dimension $4$ in the 6 dimensional MDS.
  • ...and 1 more figures