Confusion errors in identification of environmental sounds

The background sounds of everyday life make available much information about activities and objects in the environment. (Consider, for example, familiar footsteps or a sneeze.) In this study, listeners heard a tape recording of 30 such sounds and reported in writing on what they heard (free identification). Their responses showed that they identified many of the recorded events accurately, e.g., paper tearing, keys jingling, clapping, based only on acoustic information. The exception were the “thumps”, such as a door slamming, where accuracy was much poorer. Errors in identification suggest some acoustic properties or features to which listeners may have been responding. Confusion occured only within pairs or small clusters of sounds; for example, blowing-sniffing, scratching-scribbling, and footsteps-knocking-hammering. In particular, confusion occurred among items having quite similar temporal patterning, which might be described in terms of amplitude envelope of the waveform. Understanding acoustic determiners of meaningful-nonspeech-sounds identification may bring new insights into perception generally and may have application to work such as the development of sensory substitution devices for the perceptually handicapped.