The Effect of Dynamic Range Compression on Loudness and Quality Perception in Relation to Crest Factor

Two listening tests were carried out to find the changes in perceived loudness and perceived quality as the crest factors were changed for three genres (rock, electronic and jazz) as a result of limiting, a type of dynamic range compression. The stimuli ranged from crest factors of 15 dBFS to 9 dBFS with a 1 dBFS increment. Loudness and quality had significant differences between the crest factors suggesting that a change in crest factor affects both. Correlations between loudness and quality were present for rock and jazz however not for electronic suggesting that genres can affect how we perceive quality.