The internet erupted in disagreement on Tuesday over an audio clip in which the name being said depends on the listener. Some hear “Laurel.” Others hear “Yanny.”
We built a tool to gradually accentuate different frequencies in the original audio clip. Which word or name do you hear, and how far do you have to move the slider to hear the other? (The slider’s center point represents the original recording.)
The clip and original “Yanny or Laurel” poll were posted on Instagram, Reddit and other sites by high school students who said that it had been recorded from a vocabulary website playing through the speakers on a computer.
One detail may frustrate some and vindicate others: The original clip came from the vocabulary.com page for “laurel,” the word for a wreath worn on the head, “usually a symbol of victory.”
One way to understand the dynamics at work is to look at a type of chart called a spectrogram — a way to visualize how the strength of different sound frequencies varies over time. The spectrograms above show that the word “laurel” is strongest in lower frequencies, while a simulated version of the word “yanny” is stronger in higher frequencies. The audio clip shows a mixture of both.
By using the slider to manipulate which frequencies are emphasized, it makes one word or the other more prominent.
