Recalibrating the auditory system: a speed-accuracy analysis of intensity perception

Area of Science:

• Auditory Neuroscience
• Psychoacoustics
• Perceptual Psychology

Background:

• Loudness recalibration is an adaptation in auditory perception where exposure to tones of different frequencies alters relative loudness judgments.
• Previous research focused on magnitude estimates, but the neural basis remains debated.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if loudness recalibration affects response times (RTs) and errors, and to differentiate between changes in sensory sensitivity and decision criteria.
• To test the hypothesis that loudness recalibration involves changes in the representation of auditory intensity.

Main Methods:

• Participants underwent recalibration by listening to tones of varying intensities and frequencies.
• Magnitude estimations, simple RTs, and choice RTs in a speeded classification task were recorded.
• Analysis of RTs and error rates examined the speed-accuracy trade-off to distinguish sensitivity from criterion shifts.

Main Results:

• Loudness recalibration influenced both magnitude estimates and response times (simple and choice RTs).
• Changes in choice RTs were not consistently linked to error rate changes predicted by the speed-accuracy trade-off.
• This pattern suggests recalibration affects sensory processing rather than decisional criteria.

Conclusions:

• Loudness recalibration is not solely due to shifts in decisional criteria.
• The findings support the hypothesis that recalibration alters the underlying neural representation of auditory intensity.
• This provides a more nuanced understanding of auditory adaptation mechanisms.