4 ms·

I think what's going on here is that the context of the sonic character of an individual's voice is crucial to the brain's processing of the phonetic content o

I think what's going on here is that the context of the sonic character of an individual's voice is crucial to the brain's processing of the phonetic content of utterances. I spend my whole life listening critically to things. I was 100% YANNY on two sets of headphones and signal amplification paths. When I moved the slider bar about 1.5 notches to the left, LAUREL sort of "came into focus", and I felt like I grasped the human voice behind this severely distorted recording. Then, when I moved the slider back to the neutral position, I could not hear YANNY at all anymore. Only by taking a brief pause could I 'reset' my brain to hearing YANNY. There's another processing step going on that helps us deal with distorted or band-limited voices. We're reconstructing in our heads the ideal sonic image of the human voice we're supposed to be hearing. I hypothesize that if the sample in question came at the end of a few words by the speaker, not related semantically, e.g. "right, seven, purple, elephant, laurel", so the listener could reconstruct a more complete "imprint" of the speaker's voice in their mind, the YANNY outcome would drop to <1%.

cgriswald 8y ago
I found three different "points" where my perception changes. The first is, when moving left to right one notch at a time, I hear it on change on the 9th notch (1-based numbering starting with LAUREL notch as 1). If I start from right to left, I hear it switch on the middle notch. And finally, if I leave it on the 8th notch, I can hear both ways at the same time and also 'force' myself to hear one or the other. Additionally, I can make it sound like "larry", "gary", "yally" and a bunch of other things on various notches without much effort, like all those 'ghost hunting' shows and their EVPs that sound like whatever the plot needs...
zawerf 8y ago
Are you talking about the McGurk effect? You hear either Ba or Fa depending on which you expect to hear based on the lip reading (but the sound that is actually playing is Va): https://youtu.be/G-lN8vWm3m0?t=77 https://youtu.be/G-lN8vWm3m0?t=77 It is really cool that small contextual information can change our senses so dramatically without us being aware of it happening.
sgloutnikov 8y ago
Wow, I just experienced the same thing! After hearing Laurel I could not get back to hearing Yanny. Tried again after ~5-10min and Yanny is back.
hobofan 8y ago
I'm curious if there is an analogue for the black-blue/gold-white dress. I always saw it as black and blue (which it turned out to be), and held the consious beliefs that "this clearly is an overexposed photo" and "the black and blue color combo is something quite common while I've barely ever seen any gold and white clothing". I wonder if holding those beliefs can have an influence on the unconcious processing of the visual information. Similarly, for this clip, Laurel is a name (and also otherwise a word) that I've heard quite a few times in my live, while I've never heard Yanny neither as a name nor a regular word.
- nwatson 8y ago
  > " I've never heard Yanny neither as a name nor a regular word" Fortunate soul has been spared from Yanni the musician: https://youtu.be/Xw7HeJ781Do https://youtu.be/Xw7HeJ781Do (actually not so bad I guess)
  - jasonkostempski 8y ago
    20 years ago, I liked Yanni enough to see him in concert, maybe thats why I heard only Yanny for days (though I pronounce them differently). Once I heard Laurel, I haven't been able to hear Yanny since. I don't know what caused me not to be able to listen to Yanni anymore though.
trophycase 8y ago
Yes. I started only hearing Yanny, but after hearing Laurel I was slowly unable to hear Yanny again in the same way I had originally.
pygy_ 8y ago
Likewise. I had "Laurel" initially, but after going into "Yanny" territory, I can progressivley put the slider back to 100% "Laurel" and still hear "Yanny". Less so in the other direction. Perception is about matching input to pre-conscious expectation. Once your brain has been primed to one word, you keep on hearing it when given an ambiguous signal. Keyword: "priming", there's a lot of research on the topic.
- ravensraven 8y ago
  Exacly what happened to me, except that I heard Yanny first
trumpeta 8y ago
I always heard Laurel, only at 1 notch away from Yanny I hear Yanny and even then it sounds like a robot speaking.
jehlakj 8y ago
I’m seriously curious about the voices of the individuals who initially heard yanny. I can hear either when I focus on different frequencies and timbre, but I first heard laurel. To me, that is the most pleasant to hear. Yanny on the other hand sounds like a combination of robotic and nasal which isn’t to my taste. Just wondering, does your voice lie in the spectrum of the bugs bunny sound?
- qubitcoder 8y ago
  As a male with a background in foreign languages, and who heard yanny first, I can confirm that my voice doesn't lie in the spectrum of bugs bunny :). But yes, the "yanny" variant does indeed sound like a malfunctioning robot, high-pitched and nasally.

cgriswald 8y ago

I found three different "points" where my perception changes. The first is, when moving left to right one notch at a time, I hear it on change on the 9th notch (1-based numbering starting with LAUREL notch as 1). If I start from right to left, I hear it switch on the middle notch. And finally, if I leave it on the 8th notch, I can hear both ways at the same time and also 'force' myself to hear one or the other. Additionally, I can make it sound like "larry", "gary", "yally" and a bunch of other things on various notches without much effort, like all those 'ghost hunting' shows and their EVPs that sound like whatever the plot needs...

zawerf 8y ago

Are you talking about the McGurk effect? You hear either Ba or Fa depending on which you expect to hear based on the lip reading (but the sound that is actually playing is Va): https://youtu.be/G-lN8vWm3m0?t=77 https://youtu.be/G-lN8vWm3m0?t=77 It is really cool that small contextual information can change our senses so dramatically without us being aware of it happening.

sgloutnikov 8y ago

Wow, I just experienced the same thing! After hearing Laurel I could not get back to hearing Yanny. Tried again after ~5-10min and Yanny is back.

hobofan 8y ago

I'm curious if there is an analogue for the black-blue/gold-white dress. I always saw it as black and blue (which it turned out to be), and held the consious beliefs that "this clearly is an overexposed photo" and "the black and blue color combo is something quite common while I've barely ever seen any gold and white clothing". I wonder if holding those beliefs can have an influence on the unconcious processing of the visual information. Similarly, for this clip, Laurel is a name (and also otherwise a word) that I've heard quite a few times in my live, while I've never heard Yanny neither as a name nor a regular word.

nwatson 8y ago
> " I've never heard Yanny neither as a name nor a regular word" Fortunate soul has been spared from Yanni the musician: https://youtu.be/Xw7HeJ781Do https://youtu.be/Xw7HeJ781Do (actually not so bad I guess)
- jasonkostempski 8y ago
  20 years ago, I liked Yanni enough to see him in concert, maybe thats why I heard only Yanny for days (though I pronounce them differently). Once I heard Laurel, I haven't been able to hear Yanny since. I don't know what caused me not to be able to listen to Yanni anymore though.

trophycase 8y ago

Yes. I started only hearing Yanny, but after hearing Laurel I was slowly unable to hear Yanny again in the same way I had originally.

pygy_ 8y ago

Likewise. I had "Laurel" initially, but after going into "Yanny" territory, I can progressivley put the slider back to 100% "Laurel" and still hear "Yanny". Less so in the other direction. Perception is about matching input to pre-conscious expectation. Once your brain has been primed to one word, you keep on hearing it when given an ambiguous signal. Keyword: "priming", there's a lot of research on the topic.

ravensraven 8y ago
Exacly what happened to me, except that I heard Yanny first

trumpeta 8y ago

I always heard Laurel, only at 1 notch away from Yanny I hear Yanny and even then it sounds like a robot speaking.

jehlakj 8y ago

I’m seriously curious about the voices of the individuals who initially heard yanny. I can hear either when I focus on different frequencies and timbre, but I first heard laurel. To me, that is the most pleasant to hear. Yanny on the other hand sounds like a combination of robotic and nasal which isn’t to my taste. Just wondering, does your voice lie in the spectrum of the bugs bunny sound?

qubitcoder 8y ago
As a male with a background in foreign languages, and who heard yanny first, I can confirm that my voice doesn't lie in the spectrum of bugs bunny :). But yes, the "yanny" variant does indeed sound like a malfunctioning robot, high-pitched and nasally.