Expectation Bias

[pkane2001]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

Let's say you hop into a very expensive car, belonging to someone else. And as you go along, you hear various rattles and noises, from things loose in the cabin, and, from body parts not secured properly. And at a certain speed a pronounced vibration comes through the body. If you mentions these, er, behaviours to the owner, most probably an unwise choice , do think he would say, it's all in your head; a bias controlled experiencing session will demonstrate that my vehicle is, um, perfect?

 

If you hear a recording replayed very accurately, just once, and from then on it falls far short of this standard, then you have a reference experience - "faults" are all the shortcomings of the rig that you happen to be listening to, right now, that prevent that peak accuracy from being replicated.

 

Poor interconnects, etc, cause inaccuracy by allowing noise and interference to enter the reproduction chain electronics - these disturb the correct working of some part of at least one component; and the fine detail in the recording is blurred. It then becomes impossible for the ear/brain to decipher what's going on - and in the worst situation, you say, "This sounds a mess!". And this is an "obvious example" of a faulty rig.

 

 

Ah, you did well, getting on top of that "wearing off" issue ... 👍.

 

Haha! Car and now women analogies. You're expanding your repertoire, Frank! 

 

[GregWormald]

10 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

There may be good reasons why interconnects may sound different, like poor connectors, incorrect wiring, shields miswired, etc.

Yes. Relevant to "expectation bias" how?

10 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

Audio memory is very short (seconds), and the tiny details in soundstage or airiness or pace, or musicality, or whatever you think you're hearing, are easily faked by our minds. These are not easy to test for and to compare unless you do fast switching blind test without the knowledge of what device is playing. If you do that, you'll discover quickly how frequently your mind makes s**t up.

That's not the way I evaluate stereo. I use a long term comparison by noticing my response in terms of my listening behaviours—often months long.

10 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

But, expectation bias isn't a conscious state. Whether you realize it or not, you are expecting to hear something when you're listening to any new device.  The knowledge of that device being in the circuit already sets up subconscious expectations. The act of careful, focused listening helps you notice new things. Even if these things were already there before the new device.

(AND)

Just like you can't easily examine your subconscious, you can't tell what influences you to hear one thing or another. Sometimes it's the subconscious mind making stuff up by filling in "new" details, sometimes it's what you had for dinner, and sometimes it's what you read online or what a buddy told you about it. Sometimes it's what you think about the whole idea of interconnects making (or not making) a difference. 

Examining the subconscious may not be easy but it can be done, otherwise all counselling and therapy is not possible. A good part of subconscious processing is influenced by the conscious 'set-up' and pre-existing programming.

 

To reiterate: A question not answered (for me) is "How does expectation bias affect my perception when I go into a listening comparison to learn if I can actually hear a difference rather than with an expectation?"

[fas42]

4 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Haha! Car and now women analogies. You're expanding your repertoire, Frank! 

 

 

Well, have to include everything that's good in life, eh ...

[pkane2001]

6 minutes ago, GregWormald said:

Examining the subconscious may not be easy but it can be done, otherwise all counselling and therapy is not possible. A good part of subconscious processing is influenced by the conscious 'set-up' and pre-existing programming.

 

Know of many audiophiles going into therapy to determine if they can really hear changes in their tweaks?

 

8 minutes ago, GregWormald said:

To reiterate: A question not answered (for me) is "How does expectation bias affect my perception when I go into a listening comparison to learn if I can actually hear a difference rather than with an expectation?"

 

You hear things that are not there. 

 

[fas42]

7 minutes ago, GregWormald said:

To reiterate: A question not answered (for me) is "How does expectation bias affect my perception when I go into a listening comparison to learn if I can actually hear a difference rather than with an expectation?"

 

As I have said before, you can use expectation as a tool, to 'initialise' how you start a listening session - so, mentally, before you walk in the door, you decide that what you are about to hear is the best audio you have ever experienced; something that will reset your ideas on what's possible - having set an extremely high bar, you then see how long it takes to bring you back to earth; as in, it's Just Another Ordinary Rig ... you are trying to force what you are listening to to measure up to an expectation; if it succeeds, then you have gained in understanding; if it fails, then you haven't been "deceived" ...

[firedog]

4 hours ago, GregWormald said:

"How does expectation bias affect my perception when I go into a listening comparison to learn if I can actually hear a difference rather than with an expectation?"

 

You have expectations whether you are aware of them or not.

[botrytis]

4 hours ago, firedog said:

 

You have expectations whether you are aware of them or not.

 

Exactly, it is a built-in bias system.  It was developed to help keep us safe. Now it bamboozles Audiophiles.

[Confused]

9 hours ago, fas42 said:

Let's say you hop into a very expensive car, belonging to someone else. And as you go along, you hear various rattles and noises, from things loose in the cabin, and, from body parts not secured properly. And at a certain speed a pronounced vibration comes through the body. If you mentions these, er, behaviours to the owner, most probably an unwise choice , do think he would say, it's all in your head; a bias controlled experiencing session will demonstrate that my vehicle is, um, perfect?

 

If you hear a recording replayed very accurately, just once, and from then on it falls far short of this standard, then you have a reference experience - "faults" are all the shortcomings of the rig that you happen to be listening to, right now, that prevent that peak accuracy from being replicated.

 

Poor interconnects, etc, cause inaccuracy by allowing noise and interference to enter the reproduction chain electronics - these disturb the correct working of some part of at least one component; and the fine detail in the recording is blurred. It then becomes impossible for the ear/brain to decipher what's going on - and in the worst situation, you say, "This sounds a mess!". And this is an "obvious example" of a faulty rig.

I do not think there is anything here that actually relates to expectation bias. A rattle in a car is an obvious issue, my view is that expectation bias is more subtle.

 

To take this back to audio. An obvious rattle in a car would be more akin to someone demonstrating a high quality audio system, but actually playing sound from an iPad. The effect would be so obvious that expectation bias would simply not apply. Or to put this another way. If you performed a blind test of a decent $10k audio system versus the sound from an iPad, this test would likely reveal a statistically significant result. This would then verify that if an individual in a sighted test preferred the sound of the $10k system versus the iPad, this is likely to be for real reasons, rather than expectation bias.

 

So expectation bias remains, but only for more subtle differences, or indeed for where there are no real diferences at all.

 

Comparing CD players, digital steamers, amplifiers, or similar, the effects on sound quality might be more subtle, and then expectation bias might come into play.

 

The problem comes when someone claims as a fact that a difference is obvious, but actually no difference is there. The only way to verify this one way or the other is by blind testing.

[Confused]

Thinking about the above. @fas42 - do you think you suffer from expectation bias?

 

I am thinking about your recent experiments, where you were experiencing sound quality differences resulting from the curvature and support arrangement of a Toslink cable.

 

With the above, did you have some kind of control for expectation bias?

[Confused]

8 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Haha! Car and now women analogies. You're expanding your repertoire, Frank! 

 

Taking this back to Frank's car analogy, I once knew a woman who had things loose in the cabin, and body parts not secured properly.

[pkane2001]

33 minutes ago, Confused said:

Taking this back to Frank's car analogy, I once knew a woman who had things loose in the cabin, and body parts not secured properly.

 

Loose women are one of the primary sources of expectation bias, IMHO ;)

 

[botrytis]

[GregWormald]

You guys are too deterministic for me. I guess your expectation bias is getting in the way of you seeing reality.

Not a problem. I'm gone from this discussion.

[pkane2001]

45 minutes ago, GregWormald said:

You guys are too deterministic for me. I guess your expectation bias is getting in the way of you seeing reality.

Not a problem. I'm gone from this discussion.

 

Not sure what kind of scientific training you've had, but in science, a large uncertainty in an experiment is to be avoided if the results are to be trusted. Expectation bias has been demonstrated to introduce a huge uncertainty in experimental results and in many informal trials.  If you want to live with the uncertainty, that's your business, but to deny the existence of a large bias in sighted testing is not scientific nor objective.

[botrytis]

3 hours ago, GregWormald said:

You guys are too deterministic for me. I guess your expectation bias is getting in the way of you seeing reality.

Not a problem. I'm gone from this discussion.

 

As a scientist, that took stats, etc. expectation bias was discussed all the time and how one can design experiments that do away with it. Most scientists deal with it one way or the other as that is how decisions are made, expectation bias trumps all.

[botrytis]

I think after all this heavy lifting? Something fun to read....

 

Jean Paul Satre cookbook

 

I think it might hit too close to home for audiophiles.....

[fas42]

11 hours ago, Confused said:

I do not think there is anything here that actually relates to expectation bias. A rattle in a car is an obvious issue, my view is that expectation bias is more subtle.

 

For me, sub-par reproduction is as obvious as a rattle. I have a whole collection of CDs which are excellent in revealing various faults in the replay chain, and all I have to do is try one or two of them to show up the lacking in a system ... (did someone say, original mastering of Led Zep I ... ). Equivalent to driving a vehicle over a rough bit of road, and doing a sound level reading on the resulting cacophony of noise ...

 

11 hours ago, Confused said:

 

Comparing CD players, digital steamers, amplifiers, or similar, the effects on sound quality might be more subtle, and then expectation bias might come into play.

 

The problem comes when someone claims as a fact that a difference is obvious, but actually no difference is there. The only way to verify this one way or the other is by blind testing.

 

Expecting a major difference when you change something is where I see most audiophiles getting things very back to front - for me, an audio chain is a precision measuring device, of what's on the recording; the closer you get to full accuracy, the less there should be any variation. If you use a whole variety of ruler type devices to determine the length of something, then once you have a certain standard of correctness, you will have to spend a lot more money, and take far more care in how you proceed, to get any significant improvement in accuracy.

 

IME, most audio rigs are terribly poor at "measuring" recordings - hence the huge variation in what you hear, normally. Whether changing a major component, like an amplifier, makes a clearly obvious difference is a complete lottery; because it depends on how well sorted the rest of the system is. My approach would be, do what it takes to make the rest of the setup 'ideal', and then and only then compare two amplifiers - an alteration of the SQ could then be attributed to the nature of the amplifier.

 

11 hours ago, Confused said:

Thinking about the above. @fas42 - do you think you suffer from expectation bias?

 

I am thinking about your recent experiments, where you were experiencing sound quality differences resulting from the curvature and support arrangement of a Toslink cable.

 

With the above, did you have some kind of control for expectation bias?

 

I listen for the rattle ... . I have a dozen of so CDs that can very, very easily sound ugly - that is, if the system is not on its best behaviour, then the sound of the instruments is just, plain unpleasant - I hear distortion, in even plainer speak. When the SQ is at its optimum, with regard to just altering that cable link, all the tracks are showing at their best - maximum detail, minimum unpleasantness.

[fas42]

9 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Not sure what kind of scientific training you've had, but in science, a large uncertainty in an experiment is to be avoided if the results are to be trusted. Expectation bias has been demonstrated to introduce a huge uncertainty in experimental results and in many informal trials.  If you want to live with the uncertainty, that's your business, but to deny the existence of a large bias in sighted testing is not scientific nor objective.

 

The powerful tool in audio is listening for tells - you ignore the flashiness of the the components, or the stature of the manufacturers; if some part of a track is made a mess of, it's not because "It's a bad recording!"; it's because the playback is faulty ... problem is, decades of building up a belief system about this has to be undone - and this could take a looong time, .

[pkane2001]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

The powerful tool in audio is listening for tells - you ignore the flashiness of the the components, or the stature of the manufacturers; if some part of a track is made a mess of, it's not because "It's a bad recording!"; it's because the playback is faulty ... problem is, decades of building up a belief system about this has to be undone - and this could take a looong time, .

Science is not a belief system, Frank. Your approach to audio is.

[botrytis]

8 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

Science is not a belief system, Frank. Your approach to audio is.

Exactly. Many audiophiles are the same way.

[fas42]

8 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

Science is not a belief system, Frank. Your approach to audio is.

 

Which is exactly what someone who hasn't gained better understanding about what matters, and what doesn't, in achieving accurate playback could be expected to say ...

 

Anyone who has ever experienced, "Magic Sound!", from some rig, most likely not their own, over the decades of their audio journey has stumbled across what's possible. The smart, 'scientific'  approach is then to try and understand what just happened, and how to replicate it ... IME, almost no-one does ...

[botrytis]

5 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Which is exactly what someone who hasn't gained better understanding about what matters, and what doesn't, in achieving accurate playback could be expected to say ...

 

Anyone who has ever experienced, "Magic Sound!", from some rig, most likely not their own, over the decades of their audio journey has stumbled across what's possible. The smart, 'scientific'  approach is then to try and understand what just happened, and how to replicate it ... IME, almost no-one does ...

 

 

Sorry, Frank. Science isn't a belief in magic, that is religion. Science is based on facts. When you use the term, magic, with science, you have lost any credibility.

[fas42]

1 hour ago, botrytis said:

 

 

Sorry, Frank. Science isn't a belief in magic, that is religion. Science is based on facts. When you use the term, magic, with science, you have lost any credibility.

 

Dear me, it seems so hard for you to separate the subjective reaction to something experienced, to then, at some later point being able to analyse what occurred.

 

A bunch of highly educated individuals sit next to each other in a concert hall, listening to a violinist playing: one, a music lover, is enthralled by her interpretation of the piece; the next, whose hobby is studying violin making, is appalled by the tonal qualities of the instrument at times; and the third, whose profession is acoustics, spends the whole time noting how the room is reacting to transient sounds from the playing; etc, etc.

 

Single event; different foci. I use the term "magic" to describe reproduction of recordings which are convincing in their character; they have the, "fool you every time if hidden behind a curtain" quality. Of course, if your interest in recordings is something like, how does the n'th mastering of some heard a thousand times album vary from all the other versions, then perhaps one should ignore anyone who dares to use the word, magic ... .

[Confused]

Just so we are all clear here Frank, what you are saying is that you think that you do not experience any kind of expiation bias with respect to audio?

[fas42]

Expiation? ... Hmmm, "the act of extinguishing the guilt incurred by something" - okay, if you want me to atone for my sins, in going against the grain of conventional thinking, how many Hail Marys should I do?

 

But, if you mean expectation bias, I would say, generally no - I really, really, earnestly wish that when I try a tweak that it will make things better; but I learnt very early in the piece that all that wishing don't make an ounce of difference, if I haven't got a good handle on what's going on - the frustration of not solving issues back then caused me to abandon ambitious playback for over a decade; these days, all that past experience tends to push forward something to try pretty quickly, that shows itself to be of benefit.

 

The music playback is either in an acceptable zone of SQ, or not. If not, it just irks me - usually, I start fiddling. If I don't get at least some answers then I might walk away from using the setup for as many days as it takes for another thought to pop in, as to something to try. Which may or may not help ... expectation just doesn't figure, when I do this.