title: Identifying the dominating perceptual differences in headphone reproduction.
abstract: The perceptual differences between the sound reproductions of headphones were investigated in a pair-wise comparison study. Two musical excerpts were reproduced over 21 headphones positioned on a mannequin and recorded. The recordings were then processed and reproduced over one set of headphones to listeners, who were asked to evaluate their perceived degree of dissimilarity. The two musical excerpts were used in separate experiments. The processing of the recordings consisted of compensating for the influences of the playback headphones worn by the listeners as well as for the mannequin's ear canals. A multidimensional scaling analysis revealed two dominating perceptual dimensions used by the listeners to differentiate the reproductions of the headphones. These dimensions were similar for the two musical excerpts. Objective metrics are proposed to describe them, leading to correlations ranging from 0.89 to 0.97 between the dimensions and metrics. The first perceptual dimension was associated with the relative strength of bass, while the second dimension was related to the relative strength of the lower midrange.
authors.affiliation: DELTA SenseLab, Venlighedsvej 4, 2970 Hørsholm, Denmark.
authors.forename: Christer P
authors.initials: CP
authors.lastname: Volk
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire Génie Civil et Bâtiment, École Nationale des Travaux Publics de l'État, Université de Lyon, Rue Maurice Audin, 69518 Vaulx-en-Velin Cedex, France.
authors.forename: Mathieu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lavandier
authors.affiliation: Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University, Fredrik Bajers Vej 7, 9220 Aalborg East, Denmark.
authors.forename: Søren
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bech
authors.affiliation: Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University, Fredrik Bajers Vej 7, 9220 Aalborg East, Denmark.
authors.forename: Flemming
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Christensen