Burn in and peer reviewed brain research
Not to broach a religious topic, but I know burn in discussions happen all the time in audio circles. Until today, I had not found any scientific research from the brain side.
This article was interesting: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10898501/
It is a 2024 review in Cureus (Kalchev, PMC10898501) that surveyed the physiological, psychological, and social dimensions of audio burn-in. It found no substantial evidence for mechanical changes producing audible differences, and instead identified several well-documented mechanisms — ear fatigue, confirmation bias, placebo effects, and neural acclimatization — that adequately explain perceived changes without requiring the equipment to have changed at all.
Has anyone found other literature of this type – physiological, psychoacoustic, rather than engineering/mechanical? I'd be curious to learn about it.
Of course, anyone who wants to put their hand on a bible and swear that burn in is real based on personal experience is welcome to do so, but I'm hoping to find things beyond the anecdotal.
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@audphile1 Furutech GTX-D NCF Rhodium -- my Porter Port would be so crestfallen if I found a new, er, outlet. |
1. The article does not conclude that sonic changes during a burn-in period are not a physically "real" phenomenon. It merely finds that, in some cases, psychological factors can influence such perceptions. 2. As the OP predicted, I can state with some certainty, from personal experience, that at least in some instances, the phenomenon is real. The low-end of my Audeze LCD-X headpones changed dramatically after a week of burn-in. At first, I thought they might be defective, with so much mid-bass that the lower mid-range of The Beatles’ "Come Together" was barely audible. After burn-in, the bass was tight and realistic. I can confidently state that this was not confirmation error -- it was like dialing a tone control from 10 to 3. In fact, to my surprise, I experienced a similar experience with a pair of LCD-3 phones a few years later. 3. Conclusion? Like so many other audiophile controversies, the thing to remember is that you can’t prove a negative. Some can say that they definitely heard a sonic effect, some can say the opposite. If the question is whether such a sonic effect CAN exist, the former is evidence, the latter is not. IOW, burn-in is a real thing is some cases. In others, it may be little more than a psychological illusion. Case closed. But come on -- didn’t we already know this? |
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