Shared mental representations underlie metaphorical sound concepts

Area of Science:

• Psychoacoustics
• Cognitive Science
• Music Cognition

Background:

• Expert communication in sound and music relies on metaphorical language from other senses.
• The influence of specialized sound knowledge on the mental representation of auditory concepts is not well understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the acoustic characteristics of metaphorical sound concepts (brightness, warmth, roundness, roughness).
• To compare these representations across sound engineers, conductors, and non-experts.
• To determine how sound expertise influences the understanding of auditory metaphors.

Main Methods:

• Utilized Best-Worst Scaling to rate a corpus of 520 orchestral instrument sounds.
• Analyzed ratings from 24 participants across three expertise groups (sound engineers, conductors, non-experts).
• Employed machine learning algorithms to define the acoustic portraits of each concept per group.

Main Results:

• Sound engineers exhibited the highest consistency in their ratings.
• The concept of 'roughness' was consistently understood across all groups.
• 'Brightness' perception was dependent on expertise, suggesting its meaning is refined by specialized knowledge.
• Distinguishing 'roundness' and 'warmth' relies on the interplay of pitch and noise characteristics.

Conclusions:

• Sound expertise significantly refines the mental representation of metaphorical sound concepts, particularly 'brightness'.
• While some concepts like 'roughness' are widely shared, others are shaped by domain-specific experience.
• Understanding the acoustic features of pitch and noise is crucial for differentiating concepts like 'roundness' and 'warmth'.