normanstrong wrote:
"Mkuller" wrote in message
news:8AeSb.139348$sv6.754480@attbi_s52...
"Bob Marcus" wrote :
Furthermore, a sighted test always involves several different
parts of
the
brain, because you're using your eyes, as well as your memory
of
everything
you have ever heard, read, or thought about the products you
are
comparing.
To claim that sighted listening is more sensitive because it
involves
fewer
parts of the brain or less mental processing simply runs
counter to the
facts. It is LESS sensitive precisely because it involves MORE
processing
in
MORE parts of the brain.


This is just plain wrong - how did you arrive at this conclusion?

Harry Lavo wrote:
Would you care to restate that as an opinion or an hypothesis?


No, I would not. Expectation bias is an established fact, Harry.

Yes, it is. OK so far.

And it
occurs precisely because the brain is simultaneously processing
loads of
non-sonic information at the same time that it is trying to come to
a
conclusion about the sonic information.

That's an interesting conclusion - I would have thought it was due
to listener
*expectations* of two different audible stimuli being different. In
fact, in a
blind test where nothing is changed, aren't differences usually
identified?
Any evidence for your statement?
Regards,
Mike

I've asked this question before, but nobody has seen fit to answer it:
What is it that makes a sighted test sighted? Those of you who feel
that blind testing "obscures" audible differences that are easily
heard sighted--what do you mean by "sighted?"

Does the component in question have to actually be visible for the
advantages of sighted testing to be realized--or is it sufficient
simply to know the identify of the component? Suppose everything is
known; what it looks like, who made it and the model number. Is that
sufficient? Maybe one has to know all about the company, its
reputation and the price of the component?

Just what is it that makes a test "sighted?"

'Sighted' in the context of a blind protocol means:
knowing the identity of the item currently being tested/evaluated/compared, at
the moment the test datum is collected.

--

-S.

"They've got God on their side. All we've got is science and reason."
-- Dawn Hulsey, Talent Director