Developing a computerized interface for sound quality evaluation

In modern sound engineering subjective listening experiences are important tools when considering the way humans perceive and evaluate sounds. In such listening experiences different techniques to assess a subject's impression of a sound can be used, e.g. rank ordering, paired comparison, semantic differential, and many others. Regardless of the technique chosen the experimenter needs to communicate the task and ask the individuals questions and the individuals must communicate their opinion. Computerized interfaces are very attractive for this subject-experimenter-sound interaction. They can provide important features related to data collection, control over the session, and other benefits. We will present a software program that implements a computerized interface for the evaluation of sound using the semantic differential-technique. The program has a modular structure to address different needs related to the experimental conditions.