A limerick for Fechner and psychoacousticians everywhere (not mine - sorry I no longer have the source!)
A unit superb is the decibel For matters that seem inexpressible. Don't fudge or befog 'em, Just simply 10 log 'em. Psychoacousticians can be so irrepressible! J Happy Fechner Day! Claudia J. Stanny, Ph.D. Director, Center for University Teaching, Learning, and Assessment Associate Professor, Psychology University of West Florida Pensacola, FL 32514 - 5751 Phone: (850) 857-6355 or 473-7435 e-mail: csta...@uwf.edu CUTLA Web Site: http://uwf.edu/cutla/ Personal Web Pages: http://uwf.edu/cstanny/website/index.htm From: Christopher D. Green [mailto:chri...@yorku.ca] Sent: Thursday, October 22, 2009 10:24 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Fechner Day! Today is Fechner Day! It celebrates the day on which, according to legend, Gustav Theodor Fechner developed the psychophysical method by which an experimenter manipulates the intensity of a physical stimulus, and then asks (what we would now call) a participant what sort of change, if any, s/he perceives. By doing this repeatedly, one can build up a geometrical curve of the relationship between the physical and the psychological, and then fit a mathematical equation to that curve. Fechner found that the relationship is logarithmic. Smitty Stevens later decided that the relationship was a power function instead. The debate continues. Chris -- Christopher D. Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, ON M3J 1P3 Canada 416-736-2100 ex. 66164 chri...@yorku.ca http://www.yorku.ca/christo/ ========================== --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly (bsouthe...@frostburg.edu) --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly (bsouthe...@frostburg.edu)
