Enhancements to the Visual Analogue Scale, VAS, for listening tests

Three methods for perceptual rating of audio stimuli were compared. The Visual Analogue Scale, VAS, was implemented as two computer programs and compared to the VAS on paper. The first program is a straight-forward implementation, the second program introduces the Visual Sort and Rate method, VSR. VSR allows the subject to compare stimuli of similar rating to each other, thus making the ordering of the stimuli easier. The three methods were compared by using a series of stimuli having different spectral tilt. Results show that the VSR method gives better reliability in the subjects’ ratings. Average correlation coefficients increased from 0.93 for VAS on paper, to 0.95 for Computer based VAS and 0.98 for the VSR method.