Semantic Approach to the Perception of Complex Sounds

In an attempt to derive a limited number of descriptive adjectives with which to characterize passive sonar sounds, 50 U.S. Navy sonarmen (median sonar experience of one year) rated 20 different passive sonar sounds on 50 seven-point scales defined by polar-opposite adjectives (e.g., heavy-light). The intercorrelations between scales (calculated over both subjects and sounds) were factor analyzed by the Thurstone complete centroid method. Seven interpretable orthogonal factors (accounting for approximately 40% of the variance of judgments) were extracted from the data. The generality of the methodology for psychological research on auditory perception is considered and suggestions for research along these lines are presented.