Auditory change detection: simple sounds are not memorized better than complex sounds.
Laurent Demany1, Wiebke Trost, Maja Serman
1Université Bordeaux 2 , Bordeaux, France. laurent.demany@psyac.u-bordeaux2.fr
Psychological Science
|January 10, 2008
Summary
Auditory change detection differs from vision. Unlike visual tasks limited by memory at longer intervals, auditory change detection performance degrades with more tones, regardless of the interval between sounds.
Area of Science:
- Auditory perception
- Human auditory system
- Sensory processing
Background:
- Visual change detection is independent of image complexity at short interstimulus intervals (ISIs).
- Visual change detection is limited by a low-capacity memory system when ISIs exceed 100 ms.
- The mechanisms underlying auditory change detection remain less understood compared to vision.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate auditory change detection mechanisms.
- To compare auditory change detection with established visual change detection models.
- To determine the effect of stimulus complexity and interstimulus interval on auditory change detection.
Main Methods:
- Listeners performed same/different judgments on pairs of successive auditory chords.
- Chords consisted of pure tones with random frequencies; a frequency shift in one tone served as the detectable change.
- Stimulus complexity (number of tones) and interstimulus interval (0 ms vs. 2 s) were manipulated.
Main Results:
- Auditory change detection performance worsened as the number of tones in the chord increased.
- This effect of complexity was consistent across both short (0 ms) and long (2 s) interstimulus intervals.
- Similar results were observed when judging a single tone's pitch relative to a preceding chord.
Conclusions:
- Auditory change detection is influenced by stimulus complexity, unlike visual change detection at short ISIs.
- The auditory system does not appear to be limited by a low-capacity memory system in the same way as the visual system for these tasks.
- These findings suggest distinct underlying mechanisms for change detection in audition and vision.
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