Abstract
The purposes of this study were to grasp th echaracteristics of the hitting sound for the rubber-ball baseball bats which evokes an image of longer batted ball distance and to investigate the difference of sound evaluation characteristics between rubber-ball baseball players and non-players. Tweleve kinds of hitting sound for the rubber-ball baseball bats were recorded for the sound evaluation test. Ten rubber-ball baseball players and ten non-players evaluated whether those sound evoked long distance or not by using Scheffe's paired comparison method. Though the sound evaluation score of rubber-ball baseball players and that of non-players showed significant positive correlation, each group showed the distinctive trend. Rubber-ball baseball players tended to feel the sound of the bats which hitting area are covered with foamed material as longer distance batted ball relatively, whereas non-players tended to feel the sound of the bats which hitting area are made with FRP. This result indicates that the rubber-ball baseball players acquired their sound image of the longer batted ball distance through their athletic experience.
