Your post is solid Jeremy, I agree with you.

If they play 60s, it's Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison.

They also follow name recognition. You have a better chance hearing multiple songs from an artist that spanned the 70s, 80s, 90s or a combo of those decades, like Elton, The Police, Madonna, etc....

Concerning "testing", I have sat in call outs and auditorium testing which overwhelmingly tested certain songs and titles strong. The PD, MD, whoever will sit there afterward and skew it to their liking. The most bent line I heard was "Don't care what this says, it will never be played on my station". WHY do research if you will still dissect it to your liking and not follow what the listeners actually say they want to hear???? It is the most ironic they have no balls to make a gut decision, but will skew music testing to their liking?

Z