The perceptual basis of loudness ratio judgments

In Experiment 1, subjects were required to estimateloudness ratios for 45 pairs of tones. Ten 1,200-Hz tones, differing only in intensity, were used to generate the 45 distinct tone pairs. In Experiment 2, subjects were required to directly compare two pairs of tones (chosen from among the set of 45) and indicate which pair of tones had the greaterloudness ratio. In both Experiments 1 and 2, the subjects’ judgments were used to rank order the tone pairs with respect to their judged loudness ratios. Nonmetric analyses of these rank orders indicated that both magnitude estimates of loudness ratios and direct comparisons of loudness ratios were based on loudnessintervals ordifferences where loudness was a power function of sound pressure. These experiments, along with those on loudness difference judgments (Parker & Schneider, 1974; Schneider, Parker, & Stein, 1974), support Torgerson’s (1961) conjecture that there is but one comparative perceptual relationship for ioudnesses, and that differences in numerical estimates for loudness ratios as opposed to loudness intervals simply reflect different reporting strategies generated by the two sets of instructions.