Why is Double Blind Testing Controversial?

Wellfed: I was referring to people collected off the street as "knuckleheads". I should have said "average joe's", etc... I do agree with your point though : )

I can't understand why one would want to perform tests on subjects that have no idea as to what they are listening for or how to discern the differences. That is, unless one wanted to promote a certain ideology with the less than optimized test individuals and conditions. Most of the test results that are foisted upon us are those performed upon random individuals, not those that know how to listen and not just "hear". There is a BIG difference as far as i'm concerned.

Even within the ranks of "skilled listeners" you'll have variances as to what people can hear and what they listen for in terms of sonic cues and signatures. As such, if one wanted to make some type of "final statement" as to what was audible and what wasn't, you would have to assemble a very large group of individuals from all walks of life and go from there. At that point, one could start off with simple ( highly audible ) test differences and weed the crowd out from there. As the tests became harder, the "cream of the crop" would be left. At that point, we might be able to say that the average person off of the street will only make it from Point A up to point M in terms of audible discernment. Those that fell short of Point M would be considered to be below average in hearing and / or listening abilities. A select few might make it up to Point S, but anything beyond that would truly require excellent ears and trained listening skills. Beyond that point, it is possible to hear from point A to point Z under ideal conditions by a person with excellent hearing and listening skills. It would be these people that i would use as "guinea pigs" when trying to draw the line between what the human ear and brain is capable of detecting and processing in a linear manner. Does this make sense ?

This approach allows room for growth AND reduction based upon the individual. Obviously hearing and listening skills vary from person to person AND change over time. To me such testing would be logical and i might tend to believe the results a bit more.

If i had to pick and choose an individual to represent "audiophiles" as a group in terms of hearing acuity and listening skills, i would have gone with Enid Lumley circa the late 1970's and early 1980's. I have no doubt in my mind that she was a very skilled listener and had excellent hearing. I'm also 100% certain that she could hear things that i ( and probably most others ) can't. As such, her test results would give me a point of reference as to just how much one could hear and how much i was actually missing. Sean
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Sean, I always thought one of the key features of a true DBT is that the subject does not know the nature of variable element. When applied to audio the listener should not know what to listen for.

I find it interesting that both sides of this issue are strongly suspicious of the motives of the other side. It seems that the interpretation of the results are more controversial than the actual DBT itself.

Onhwy61 -- it is specifically the motivations that yield the controversy. A DBT could, with great effort, be designed to yield reasonably valid results. The posts above suggest that such effort is seldom made because the test sponsors don't understand or believe that effort is required. Without going through all that work, the test becomes a "double deaf test" as Unsound suggests.

A true double blind test wouldn't be easy to set up, but as a scientific experiment it really isn't very hard. As far as interpreting the results of an experiment goes, I don't think you can design an experiment that isn't open to misinterpretation. It's a very different statement and attitude to say that a DBT has to be well designed and rigorous than to say DBTs serve no useful purpose.