Abstract
Detection of a signal in the presence of diotic masking noise is much better when the signal differs in terms of its interaural parameters from the masking noise. Besides contributing to the detectability of a signal, interaural time delays (ITDs) also allow the listener to lateralize the signal. In this study, we investigate how detection and lateralization of time-delayed signals are affected by the diotic masking noise. All stimuli covered a spectral range from 250 to 850 Hz. The interaurally time-delayed signals consisted either of noise, or a tone-complex with 20 Hz intercomponent spacing. ITDs were 0.1 or 0.6 msec. Results show that detection performance is strongly dependent on the ITD with a 10 dB increase in threshold going from 0.6 to 0.1 msec ITD. Interestingly, lateralization thresholds, although being higher than detection thresholds, are much less dependent on ITD; only a few dB change in threshold is observed. An additional ITD adjustment experiment was performed where the ITD of a tone complex in isolation had to be adjusted to an ITD tone-complex presented in diotic and roving-ITD masking noise. Listeners were able to perform this adjustment reliably suggesting that in the noise, the tone complex effectively functions as a segregated object.
| Original language | English |
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| Title of host publication | Proceedings of the 19th International Congress on Acoustics (ICA 2007), September 2-7, 2007 |
| Editors | A. Perez-Lopez, J.S. Santiago, A. Calvo-Manzano |
| Place of Publication | Madrid |
| Publisher | Instituto de Acústica |
| Pages | 3855-3860 |
| ISBN (Print) | 978-1-61567-707-8 |
| Publication status | Published - 2007 |
| Event | conference; ICA 2007; 2007-09-02; 2007-09-07 - Duration: 2 Sept 2007 → 7 Sept 2007 |
Conference
| Conference | conference; ICA 2007; 2007-09-02; 2007-09-07 |
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| Period | 2/09/07 → 7/09/07 |
| Other | ICA 2007 |