Let's share placebo effect anecdotes!

[Timcognito]

In my career I have worked on the development of several devices and treatments for the heart and cardiovascular diseases that required double blind studies where the control was non treatment or drugs, so there was very little chance for a placebo effect for patients that got device interventions. It was clear within hours to days improvement was or was not there. But in drug studies were the patient know they received the real therapy placebo is an issue. But if the patient is told in advance that they have 50% chance of getting the sugar pill the placebo effect goes way down. Placebo comes with an expectation of success. "Wait until to you hear how much this cable improves the sound"

 

[Curupira]

My best one was when I configured a Headphone 3D emulation software VERY precisely so I could pinpoint things around my head with surgical precision:

I spent almost an hour adjusting each slider separately by playing the binaural testing demo until I nailed everything down to my hrtf. I then proceeded to test the software in a game I played and noticed how accurate the NPCs and sounds were! It made my claustrophobic HD 650s sound wide like a HD800S, I just couldn't believe how this software was free.

Then I noticed I had routed the wrong Virtual cable on the software's output, and the program actually wasn't working at all. All I was hearing the whole time was the binaural recording through stereo and, in-game, just good ol' stereo. I then actually turned the program and heard how it made everything sound like I was inside a bathroom. Never touched it again (although I do recognize it can be useful when well configured).

 

[richard12511]

I tend to think that visual distractions afford us fewer neutrons to process the sound, so we’re less critical of it. There’s a corollary in immersive audio, I think: I suspect Dolby Atmos, as an example (I have a 6.4.4 system) gets away with lower bit rates per channel in part because there’s so much going on spatially much of the time that our brains get too distracted to lock in on minor sound quality imperfections.

For anyone who hasn’t tried it, do listen sometime to your system in complete darkness and note how incredibly expansive the sound space seems to become when your brain loses all visual bias created by the visibility of the walls in your room.

I first noticed this phenomenon in college when I got really into blind taste testing beers in order to rank them and discover my preferences. Closing my eyes made me "better" at tasting, or at least I thought it did .

 

[kemmler3D]

I first noticed this phenomenon in college when I got really into blind taste testing beers in order to rank them and discover my preferences. Closing my eyes made me "better" at tasting, or at least I thought it did .

As a side note, I highly recommend getting some friends together and doing blind tastings if the idea appeals to you. I've done it twice, and found out two important things:

1) Maker's mark isn't actually bad
2) Grey Goose is actually bad

 

[JaMaSt]

Several years ago I owned the Schiit Modi DAC, the Loki 4-band tone control and the Vali tube amp. I was trying to determine if I could hear a difference when the Loki switch was set to bypass the signal directly from the DAC to the Amp. I kept throwing the Loki switch on then off - and was sure I could hear a difference. I took a break for about 20 minutes and resumed testing - flipping the bypass switch - still sure I could hear a difference. However......

.... before I took the break, I had completely and totally removed the Loki tone control from the line up. I'd unplugged the RCA's and plugged the DAC RCA's directly into the Amp. So, for like 10 minutes, I was sure I was hearing a difference in a component that wasn't even in the system.

 

[Multicore]

For good stereo effect I need to close my eyes or keep the room pretty dark , I actually lit the room with small varm light sources rather than from above with strong light .
otherwise the disconnect between what’s seen and heard is to big .
My stereo and speakers has a certain look that influences things and behind them are windows to my patio and garden , a quite busy scenery.
So I bee looking at my garden furniture and the Apple three we can’t have Nora jones in the Apple three

Perhaps related I think stereo is most effective when watching movies or TV with well made sound. I'm not looking at speakers and have visual cues to help with the spatial effects.

 

[richard12511]

As a side note, I highly recommend getting some friends together and doing blind tastings if the idea appeals to you. I've done it twice, and found out two important things:

1) Maker's mark isn't actually bad
2) Grey Goose is actually bad

Never done it with Whiskey, but I bet that's fun!.

We did it once or twice a week with beer in college(4 of us). We kept 2 fridge fulls of like 10-20 beers at any given time; one person would pick the 3 beers and conduct the test, and the other 3 roommates would be the tasters.

Then I went through another period around 2015? Where a friend and I were doing it 2-3 times a week. This is where I really learned exactly the styles I like the most and it's really guided me since then. We also collected all the data in a google docs spreadsheet, and it's kinda what got me into doing blind listening tests. Tons of fun!

My neighbor and I have been getting back into it this last year, adding even more data.

 

[StigErik]

My most embarrassing story is about this magic device, supposed to “demagnetize” phono cartridges. Whatever that means. Anyway, I was very confident that its effect was profound. And that was before I remembered to install the batteries ….

 

[kemmler3D]

Never done it with Whiskey, but I bet that's fun!.

We did it once or twice a week with beer in college(4 of us). We kept 2 fridge fulls of like 10-20 beers at any given time; one person would pick the 3 beers and conduct the test, and the other 3 roommates would be the tasters.

Then I went through another period around 2015? Where a friend and I were doing it 2-3 times a week. This is where I really learned exactly the styles I like the most and it's really guided me since then. We also collected all the data in a google docs spreadsheet, and it's kinda what got me into doing blind listening tests. Tons of fun!

My neighbor and I have been getting back into it this last year, adding even more data.

One other lesson I have from the whiskey tasting... your palate really loses the thread after 6 or 7 samples. We did 12 different bottles, after a while it was hard to render an opinion other than "yep, it's whiskey". So I'd recommend doing maybe 4 or 5 at a time.

 

[gaz]

I recently bought an external mic for my phone for recording. Plugged it in, did a short recording and thought it was great.

But it wasn't working! The phone's OTG settings must be changed, and my time wasted, for it to work.

(Rode VideoMic Me-C, directional, recommended.)

(Android modified by OnePlus, not recommended.)

 

[GGroch]

........ To me, it's not so clear the distinction between imagined and heard when it's the same device that does both things(the brain).

If our brain's placebo can actually cure us of disease, then I see no reason why it can't actually make us actually "hear" something that doesn't exist......

One of my buddies from undergrad ended up developing schizophrenia a few years after we graduated. I've talked to him several times about it, and from the way he describes it, he is actually "hearing" people that don't exist say random things to him. .......
TLDR: I think the effect in audio might be every bit as real as it is in medicine.

I think this is right.
The YouTube Tedx Talk by Georg Keller I linked to above describes it like this:

"…Perception is always a comparison between what we predict to hear to see to feel to smell and what is actually there.
Suppose for a second this finely tuned balance between predictions and actual sensory input were skewed in favor of predictions one might see things that aren't actually there, one might hear things that aren't there, and project intentions into other people that aren't there...

Conversely if predictions were too weak the world might appear unpredictable and magical and intentions of other people hard to understand and one might resort to doing the same thing over and over again in an attempt to restore predictability.

The former are symptoms of what we call schizophrenia, the latter those of what we call autism."

Keller says that we only notice the prediction side of perception when it is mistaken or ambiguous, like in 2015s famous blue/black gold/white dress mime.

 

[KenA]

I don't know if this counts but I keep a tiny speaker in place between my speakers. For whatever reason it really helps my brain pull the center into place. I just used it for fun one to see how it'd work as a center on it's own (pretty damn good actually) but I keep it there now for that imaging improvement. Literally sounds like some song elements are coming from the speaker, brains are neat. Oh god please don't tell Danny about this, he will sell a speaker with no inputs that improves imaging.

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I had a similar experience. I have both home theatre and separate stereo systems. The HT centre speaker is immediatly under the TV. When I listened to stereo I found myself looking at the centre speaker, due to the stereo centre imaging. It seems the sound was coming out of that speaker. Under the TV. It annoyed me so much (ie that sound was coming directly from that speaker) that I moved the HT centre speaker to a position above the TV. This took a bit as I have in-wall wires, so had to rip new holes in my wall etc. When all done, with the HT speaker now above the screen, I played stereo. And you know what? I swear the centre image sound still comes out of that speaker, now from above the TV!