Sitting close to a rear wall creates early strong reflections that corrupt perceived sound

Evidence

It is an unfortunate fact of many home listening rooms, and I have experienced it in some hotel-room audio-show demonstrations. The ideal solution is to move the listener away from the wall, but with limited space this may not be possible. Figure 13.13 shows what happens; a whole new set of reflections is created, and the ones immediately following the direct sounds from the loudspeakers are very early and very strong. There will be ceiling reflections as well. — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 1503

Categorization

• XREF: Extends the reviewer-chair anecdote in 1502 into the underlying causal mechanism of boundary proximity creating early strong reflections.