Synesthetic Explorations: An Autoethnographic Study on Music, Color, and Creativity/Pitch Summary

Battery Tests Results - Summary

**Battery Tests Results**

	Raw Color Counts (Uncorrected)														Z-score Corrected Target Color
Pitch	Red	Red-Orange	Orange	Yellow-Orange	Yellow	Yellow-Green	Green	Blue-Green	Blue	Blue-Violet	Violet	Red-Violet	Pink	Total (n)	R	G	B	Color Name	Margin of Error
A	0	0	0	0	4	12	0	0	0	0	2	0	0	18	153	246	11	YELLOW-GREEN	6.03%
As	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	4	13	0	18	237	32	172	RED-VIOLET	4.66%
B	1	0	0	0	0	12	2	3	0	0	0	0	0	18	34	224	148	BLUE-GREEN	7.11%
C	14	3	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	18	245	23	10	RED	2.88%
Cs	0	0	0	0	4	0	0	13	0	0	0	0	0	17	67	171	136	BLUE-GREEN	11.94%
D	0	0	2	9	1	5	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	18	219	186	22	YELLOW-ORANGE	4.94%
Ds	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	3	0	12	2	0	18	215	43	181	RED-VIOLET	9.08%
E	0	0	0	0	0	16	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	18	116	246	10	YELLOW-GREEN	4.93%
F	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	4	13	0	18	218	9	123	RED-VIOLET	4.82%
Fs	0	0	0	3	0	3	12	0	0	0	0	0	0	18	40	138	77	GREEN	7.81%
G	0	1	9	6	0	0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	18	232	121	15	RED-ORANGE	3.98%
Gs	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	17	0	0	0	0	18	64	7	248	BLUE	2.48%
Battery Tests Results - Summary
hiC	4	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	14	18	249	104	98	PINK	6.00%
Total	19	4	11	18	9	51	14	17	20	2	24	30	14

**Synesthetic Consistency Table based on Margin of Errors**

Tier	Pitch	Shades of Colors	Number of Occurrences (n=18)	Margin of Error
1	Gs	Blue	17 occurrences of Blue	2.48%
1	C	Red	14 occurrences of Red, 3 of Red-Orange	2.88%
1	G	Orange, Red-Orange, Yellow-Orange	9 occurrences of Orange, 6 of Red-Orange, 3 of Yellow-Orange	3.98%
2	As	Red-Violet, Blue-Violet	13 occurrences of Red-Violet, 4 of Blue-Violet	4.66%
2	E	Yellow-Green	16 occurrences of Yellow-Green	4.93%
2	F	Red-Violet, Violet	13 occurrences of Red-Violet, 4 of Violet	4.82%
2	D	Yellow-Orange, Yellow-Green	9 occurrences of Yellow-Orange, 5 of Yellow-Green	4.94%
2	hiC	Pink, Red	14 occurrences of Pink, 4 of Red	6.00%
3	A	Yellow-Green, Yellow, Red-Violet	12 occurrences of Yellow-Green, 4 of Yellow, 2 of Red-Violet	6.03%
3	B	Yellow-Green, Blue-Green, Red	12 occurrences of Yellow-Green, 3 of Blue-Green, 1 of Red	7.11%
3	Fs	Green, Blue-Green	12 occurrences of Green, 3 of Blue-Green	7.81%
3	Ds	Red-Violet, Blue-Violet	12 occurrences of Red-Violet, 3 of Blue-Violet	9.08%
3	Cs	Blue-Green, Yellow-Green	13 occurrences of Blue-Green, 4 of Yellow-Green	11.94%

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy - Tests sorted by Margin of Errors (Fig. 1)

Battery Tests Results - Geometric distance method

**Battery Test Results Based on Geometric Distances**

Battery	A	As	B	C	Cs	D	Ds	E	F	Fs	G	Gs	hiC	Average
Battery 1	1.4	0.7	1.2	0.3	1.3	1.0	0.6	0.5	0.9	0.7	0.8	0.5	1.5	0.9	PASS
Battery 2	0.3	0.2	1.5	0.6	3.5	1.5	0.9	1.2	0.4	0.6	1.2	0.6	1.4	1.1	FAILED
Battery 3	4.0	0.8	3.0	4.0	3.6	2.7	3.8	4.0	0.6	0.4	4.2	4.5	0.7	2.8	FAILED
Battery 4	0.4	0.4	1.4	0.6	1.0	1.4	0.7	1.7	0.6	0.1	0.7	0.2	2.3	0.9	PASS
Battery 5	1.8	1.5	0.7	1.3	3.5	0.8	0.8	3.2	2.8	0.2	0.5	0.6	0.3	1.4	FAILED
Battery 6	1.2	0.3	0.7	0.2	0.2	0.3	0.7	1.0	0.3	0.2	0.2	0.3	0.3	0.5	PASS
**Success Rate**	33%	67%	33%	67%	17%	33%	83%	17%	83%	100%	67%	83%	50%	50%

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy - Battery Test Results

**Consistency Score – Geometric Distances**

Test	A	As	B	C	Cs	D	Ds	E	F	Fs	G	Gs	hiC
1	0.54	0.18	0.87	0.14	0.43	0.39	1.58	0.20	0.20	0.20	0.14	0.25	0.96
2	0.39	0.33	0.47	0.13	0.51	0.52	0.04	0.22	0.22	0.11	0.24	0.23	0.74
3	0.56	0.25	0.25	0.16	0.25	0.31	0.31	0.20	0.20	0.46	0.33	0.14	0.29
4	0.42	0.29	0.62	0.04	1.36	0.36	1.45	0.25	0.25	0.64	0.26	0.12	0.35
5	0.13	0.09	0.32	0.18	1.20	0.57	0.33	0.60	0.60	0.05	0.22	0.31	0.05
6	0.08	0.05	0.65	0.24	1.10	0.37	0.13	0.44	0.44	0.19	0.53	0.25	0.66
7	0.41	0.43	0.52	0.06	0.96	0.50	0.33	0.55	0.55	0.40	2.37	0.16	0.12
8	1.91	0.24	0.27	0.10	1.43	0.36	0.19	2.00	2.00	0.20	2.08	0.05	0.11
9	0.16	0.33	1.40	1.98	1.66	1.02	1.79	1.98	1.98	0.26	1.61	2.21	0.37
10	1.35	0.40	1.52	2.05	0.89	1.49	2.29	0.17	0.17	0.65	1.84	2.14	1.11
11	0.15	0.16	0.59	0.14	0.48	0.70	0.32	0.16	0.16	0.30	0.12	0.08	1.09
12	0.14	0.10	0.16	0.29	0.04	0.09	0.10	0.68	0.68	0.24	0.21	0.07	0.13
13	0.84	0.53	0.77	0.18	0.09	0.25	0.25	1.29	1.29	0.08	0.16	0.15	0.05
14	0.28	0.69	0.34	0.27	1.71	0.28	0.33	1.42	1.42	0.09	0.20	0.12	0.11
15	0.60	0.23	0.24	0.51	1.71	0.12	0.27	0.22	0.22	1.37	0.09	0.19	0.07
16	0.25	0.29	0.29	0.43	0.13	0.24	0.29	0.54	0.54	1.39	0.09	0.28	0.16
17	0.30	0.04	0.15	0.04	0.08	0.10	0.16	0.42	0.42	0.06	0.06	0.13	0.05
18	0.31	0.10	0.19	0.08	0.05	0.11	0.33	0.20	0.20	0.12	0.06	0.01	0.11
**AVG**	0.49	0.26	0.54	0.39	0.78	0.43	0.58	0.64	0.64	0.38	0.59	0.38	0.36
**MIN**	0.08	0.04	0.15	0.04	0.04	0.09	0.04	0.16	0.16	0.05	0.06	0.01	0.05
**MAX**	1.91	0.69	1.52	2.05	1.71	1.49	2.29	2.00	2.00	1.39	2.37	2.21	1.11

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy - Consistency Score

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy - Consistency Score - AVG

Battery Tests Results - Z-score

**Maximum RGB Absolute Z-Score per Pitch**

Test	A	As	B	C	Cs	D	Ds	E	F	Fs	G	Gs	hiC	Nb Outliers	% Outliers
1	0.5	0.5	2.0	0.3	0.6	1.0	1.6	0.4	0.3	2.4	0.6	1.9	1.8	2	11.11%
2	0.8	1.6	0.9	0.7	1.4	0.8	1.6	0.5	0.9	1.9	1.3	0.4	0.4	0	0.00%
3	0.8	0.8	1.1	0.4	1.5	0.7	2.0	0.3	1.1	1.9	0.4	1.1	0.8	1	5.56%
4	0.3	1.7	0.7	0.4	1.7	1.8	0.6	1.0	1.1	1.0	0.5	0.4	1.6	0	0.00%
5	0.4	1.7	1.3	0.7	0.7	0.2	0.7	0.9	1.3	0.5	0.4	0.8	1.6	0	0.00%
6	0.1	1.5	1.5	0.2	1.4	2.1	1.0	0.5	0.7	1.8	1.6	0.2	0.6	1	5.56%
7	1.3	0.6	0.7	0.3	1.9	0.5	0.6	1.2	1.4	1.8	3.5	1.2	1.1	1	5.56%
8	2.9	0.9	0.6	0.4	1.5	1.1	0.3	3.2	0.8	2.0	0.6	0.9	1.8	3	16.67%
9	2.6	0.9	2.7	3.8	1.5	3.5	2.8	1.1	1.6	1.9	2.7	4.0	1.1	7	38.89%
10	1.2	1.0	0.9	0.6	1.1	2.2	1.0	1.3	0.8	0.7	0.8	0.3	2.0	2	11.11%
11	0.7	1.2	2.1	0.4	0.9	0.6	0.8	0.7	1.3	0.7	0.5	0.4	1.0	1	5.56%
12	1.0	0.7	1.9	0.7	0.9	0.4	0.8	1.6	1.0	0.7	0.6	0.3	1.5	0	0.00%
13	1.9	3.6	0.8	0.8	1.1	1.0	0.8	2.7	1.0	0.7	0.7	1.0	1.1	2	11.11%
14	0.9	0.6	0.7	0.8	2.1	0.5	1.0	0.9	0.9	0.7	0.6	0.3	0.6	1	5.56%
15	1.1	1.8	0.7	1.0	1.2	0.7	0.7	0.5	3.8	0.7	0.5	0.1	0.8	1	5.56%
16	0.5	0.9	1.5	0.5	1.0	1.1	0.7	1.4	1.1	0.6	0.7	0.9	1.1	0	0.00%
17	0.6	0.8	0.7	0.4	0.9	0.7	0.8	0.5	1.1	0.7	0.5	0.3	1.3	0	0.00%
18	1.6	0.7	0.7	0.5	0.8	0.9	1.0	0.4	0.8	0.6	0.4	0.3	0.7	0	0.00%
Nb outliers	2.0	1.0	3.0	1.0	1.0	3.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	2.0	2.0	1.0	1.0	22	9.40%
% outliers	11%	6%	17%	6%	6%	17%	11%	11%	6%	11%	11%	6%	6%

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy – Max Z-Score per Pitch

**Total Absolute Deviation Score (TADS) – Corrected Excluding Outliers**

Test	A	As	B	C	Cs	D	Ds	E	F	Fs	G	Gs	hiC
1	1.1	1.0		0.6	1.5	2.3	4.0	0.9	0.6		1.5	2.5	4.9
2	1.1	3.4	1.9	0.9	3.0	2.1	3.9	1.0	1.4	3.9	2.1	0.8	0.4
3	1.7	1.3	2.7	0.9	2.6	1.4		0.7	2.0	4.1	0.5	1.8	2.1
4	0.6	3.7	0.9	1.0	3.4	3.6	1.3	1.6	2.3	1.7	1.0	0.9	3.2
5	0.5	3.3	1.5	1.4	0.8	0.3	1.5	1.5	2.5	1.1	0.9	1.1	4.5
6	0.2	3.0	2.4	0.5	3.5		2.1	1.1	1.2	3.0	2.0	0.5	0.9
7	1.8	0.9	1.7	0.8	3.2	1.3	0.8	1.4	3.0	4.7		1.6	1.8
8		1.7	0.7	1.0	3.4	1.4	0.7		1.6		1.1	1.3	2.0
9		1.6			3.0			1.4	3.2	3.5			2.5
10	2.2	2.6	2.4	1.4	1.7		2.6	2.3	1.6	1.5	1.5	0.7
11	1.7	2.1		0.8	2.0	1.3	1.7	1.8	2.3	1.3	1.0	1.0	1.9
12	1.8	1.4	3.3	1.6	1.9	0.8	1.6	2.5	1.4	1.0	1.2	0.7	2.9
13	2.8		1.7	1.6	2.0	2.3	1.5		1.9	2.0	1.8	1.7	2.5
14	1.8	1.4	1.5	1.7		0.6	2.5	1.5	1.3	1.6	1.6	0.9	1.0
15	1.9	3.2	1.3	1.6	2.1	1.3	1.3	1.1		1.3	1.1	0.2	2.0
16	1.4	1.6	2.9	1.0	2.0	1.9	1.6	2.4	1.6	0.8	1.1	1.5	2.9
17	1.5	1.5	2.1	0.9	1.7	1.4	1.8	0.9	1.7	1.5	1.1	0.6	2.9
18	2.4	1.7	1.7	1.4	1.5	1.6	2.3	0.8	1.1	1.4	0.8	0.6	1.3
Mean	1.5	2.1	1.9	1.1	2.3	1.6	1.9	1.4	1.8	2.1	1.3	1.1	2.3

**Total Absolute Deviation Score (TADS) – Outliers**

Test	A	As	B	C	Cs	D	Ds	E	F	Fs	G	Gs	hiC
1			3.2							3.3
2
3						4.8
4
5
6						2.3
7											8.4
8	6.4							7.2		4.3
9	6.3		5.8	11.2		7.4	6.6			6.2	10.6
10							4.1					4.1
11			4.1
12
13		5.8					6.4
14				4.3
15									7.4
16
17
18
Mean	6.4	5.8	4.4	11.2	4.3	4.6	5.7	6.8	7.4	3.8	7.3	10.6	4.1

Synesthetic Explorations by Arnaud Quercy – TADS Outlier vs Inliers

Explanation of Table

- **RGB Value**:

 - **Represents the **Average Target Color**, calculated as the mean of the RGB values across all trials, excluding outliers. Outliers are identified using a Z-score threshold of 2 (\(|Z| > 2\)), meaning data points that deviate from the mean by more than two standard deviations are excluded from the calculation.

 - **Recalculation Excluding Outliers**: After removing outliers (values where \(|Z| > 2\)), the averages, minimums, and maximums of the RGB values are recalculated using only the remaining inliers. This recalculation provides a more accurate representation of the target color by reducing the influence of extreme values. The outlier-excluded mean thus better reflects the consistent synesthetic color for each pitch.

- **Margin of Error (R, G, B)**:

 - **Formula**: 
   AVG( (1.96 × R-Standard Deviation / 255), (1.96 × G-Standard Deviation / 255), (1.96 × B-Standard Deviation / 255) )
 - This formula calculates the margin of error for each of the Red (R), Green (G), and Blue (B) channels, normalizes it to a 0-1 scale by dividing by 255, and then takes the average of the three values to get the overall margin of error for the color.

 - **Explanation: This formula calculates the margin of error, which provides a 95% confidence interval around the average RGB values for the target color. In other words, there is a 95% probability that the true average color falls within this range, based on the data collected for each pitch. The margin of error is calculated using the standard deviation of the inliers only, excluding outliers (Z-score > |2|), to ensure consistency. The percentage expresses the degree of confidence that the average target color is representative of the synesthetic experience for each pitch based on the analysis.

- **Color Columns**:

 - The columns labeled with colors (e.g., Red, Red-Orange) indicate the number of occurrences of each color in a 12-segment color wheel classification during the test. This provides a measure of how consistent the synesthetic experience is for each pitch. These counts are presented without applying any statistical correction or considering geometric or Euclidean distances between the colors.

Analytical Summary: Cross-Pitch Synesthetic Patterns and Sensory Overlaps

This section integrates detailed empirical findings from each pitch, providing an interpretive overview of color associations, consistency patterns, and perceptual trends observed across the pitch spectrum.

1. High Consistency and Stability in Core Color Associations

Dominant Colors: For most pitches, specific colors consistently emerged, such as red-violet for D# and F, blue for G#, and pink for High C. These dominant associations appeared stable across batteries, reflecting strong sensory connections between certain pitches and their synesthetic color mappings.

Consistency Scores: Pitches A, A#, D, F, and High C demonstrated high inlier percentages, often above 90%, indicating robust alignment in color perception. These high consistency scores suggest a stable cross-sensory mapping for pitches where color is more universally perceived, potentially indicating that certain pitches naturally evoke stronger color responses.

2. Pitch-Specific Variability and Outlier Patterns

Pitches with Higher Variability: Pitches B, C#, and G showed more variability in their color mappings, with noticeable standard deviations in RGB values, especially in the red and blue channels. These findings may imply a more flexible or context-dependent perception of these pitches, where individual differences in synesthetic experiences could play a greater role.

Outliers: Outliers appeared prominently in pitches such as F# (yellow-green shifts) and G (blue-violet shifts). These deviations could indicate perceptual or cognitive shifts tied to the pitch’s auditory qualities or pitch proximity effects, where certain pitches might blur sensory boundaries and evoke alternative colors in specific contexts.

3. Patterns of Sensory Overlap and Common Color Mappings

Shared Color Hues Across Pitches: Some color hues recur across multiple pitches. For example, red-violet appears as a dominant or secondary color for several pitches (e.g., D#, F, High C), which might reflect a common auditory-to-visual translation within this tonal range.

Blue and Green Associations: Pitches in the G to F# range showed a tendency for blue or green hues, possibly indicating that lower frequencies in this range stimulate cooler colors in synesthetic perception. This pattern aligns with general synesthetic theories suggesting that pitch frequency might influence color warmth or coolness.

4. Interpretive Trends and Theoretical Implications

Pitch Proximity Effects: The variability and outlier shifts in pitches close to each other (e.g., F and F# or C# and D) suggest a phenomenon where slight tonal changes might affect color perception consistency. This could support the idea of a perceptual “bleed,” where adjacent pitches influence each other’s color associations.

Cognitive and Contextual Influences: The stability in primary color associations for certain pitches, such as A and High C, hints at potential innate perceptual anchors. In contrast, more variable pitches, such as C# and G, might be more influenced by cognitive or contextual factors, suggesting that not all synesthetic associations are fixed and may adapt depending on situational cues.

5. Cross-Pitch Observations and Synthesis

Overall Cohesion in Synesthetic Mappings: Despite some variability, the overarching trend is one of stable color associations, with high consistency in dominant hues across the pitch spectrum. This cohesion suggests a structured sensory mapping system, where specific pitches reliably evoke particular colors.

Implications for Synesthetic Theory: The high consistency in certain pitches supports the theory of cross-modal correspondences, where specific auditory stimuli consistently link to specific visual experiences. Meanwhile, the noted variability in other pitches could provide a foundation for exploring flexible or context-sensitive models of synesthetic perception.