Where does texture collide?

The size, shape, and arrangement of the mineral grains or crystals that make up a rock, read as a record of how the rock formed: a slowly cooled magma grows large interlocking crystals (coarse-grained), while a quickly chilled one stays fine-grained, and deformation or metamorphism leaves its own fabric. Vernon's 2004 A Practical Guide to Rock Microstructure set out how these grain-scale features are described and used to infer a rock's history. The referent is the geometry of grains packed through a solid rock, not the way voices combine in music, the feel of a food in the mouth, or the roughness of a machined surface.[1]

Unit

A rock's grain-scale geometry, from coarse-grained to fine-grained

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Examined in thin section under a petrographic microscope, describing grain size, shape, boundaries, and orientation

The way the melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic lines of a piece are combined and layered: a single unaccompanied line (monophony), a melody carried over supporting chords (homophony), or several independent lines woven together at once (polyphony). Huron's 1989 study Voice Denumerability in Polyphonic Music of Homogeneous Timbres treated texture as the number of concurrent voices a listener can track and measured that limit experimentally. The referent is the arrangement of simultaneous voices in sound over time, not grains in a rock, the feel of a food, or the geometry of a surface.[2]

Unit

The number and relationship of simultaneous voices in a passage

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Described by analysis of the score, and studied experimentally by how many concurrent voices listeners can count

The structural and mechanical properties of a food as they are perceived through touch, biting, and chewing, such as crispness, hardness, chewiness, or the thickness of a liquid on the tongue. Szczesniak's 2002 Texture is a sensory property argued that texture is a human response to a food's structure, and her 1963 Classification of Textural Characteristics earlier organised these qualities and grounded the instrumental texture-profile method. The referent is how a food's structure feels when handled and eaten, not the grain fabric of a rock, the layering of musical voices, or the roughness of a surface.[3][4]

Unit

A food's perceived mechanical qualities during handling and eating

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Rated by trained sensory panels and reproduced instrumentally by texture-profile analysis with a texturometer

The fine-scale geometry of a manufactured surface: the closely spaced peaks and valleys called roughness, the longer-wavelength waviness beneath them, and the directional lay left by cutting or grinding. Jiang and Whitehouse's 2012 review Technological shifts in surface metrology traced how these height deviations are defined, traced, and reduced to parameters. The referent is the height map of the thin outer skin of a solid, measured in micrometres, not the grains packed through a rock, the combining of musical voices, or the feel of a food in the mouth.[5]

Unit

A surface's height deviations from its ideal form, at micrometre scale

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Traced by a stylus profilometer or optical instrument and summarised by parameters such as the average roughness Ra