The tritone paradox is an auditory illusion in which a pair of Shepard tones separated by a tritone, half an octave apart, is heard by some listeners as ascending in pitch and by other listeners as descending. Roger Shepard argued in 1963 that such tone pairs should sound genuinely ambiguous, but psychologist of music Diana Deutsch found in 1986 that individual listeners actually judge the pairs consistently, with the direction each person hears depending on where the tones sit on the chromatic circle, an effect that also varies with the listener own language or dialect.
Facts
First Described YearPsychology of music researcher Diana Deutsch in 1986 discovered that judgments of individual listeners depended on the positions of the tones along the chromatic circle. (w-bbfill-psychology6-0926) Classification
Type of Phenomenon Sources
1. Wikipedia: Tritone Paradox
WikipediaWikipedia article text
Psychology of music researcher Diana Deutsch in 1986 discovered that judgments of individual listeners depended on the positions of the tones along the chromatic circle.
lead section, phenomenon-kind classification
The tritone paradox is an auditory illusion in which a sequentially played pair of Shepard tones separated by an interval of a tritone, or half octave, is heard as ascending by some people and as descending by others.
View the Source Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.