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Lateralization of rectangularly modulated noise: explanations for counterintuitive reversals
R M Stern1, T Zeppenfeld, G D Shear
1Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213.
The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
|October 1, 1991
Summary
Binaural hearing research reveals that sounds with delayed gating functions are perceived towards the lagging ear, challenging standard interaural time delay (ITD) perceptions. The position-variable model effectively explains these counterintuitive lateralization phenomena.
Area of Science:
- Auditory Neuroscience
- Psychoacoustics
- Binaural Hearing
Background:
- Investigates counterintuitive auditory phenomena where gated noise is perceived towards the lagging ear, contradicting typical interaural time delay (ITD) interpretations.
- Analyzes cross-correlation functions of dichotic gated-noise stimuli to understand perceptual reversals.
Discussion:
- Compares lateralization predictions from cross-correlation, interaural delay, and position-variable models against experimental data.
- Highlights the limitations of cross-correlation and interaural group delay models in explaining observed phenomena.
- Demonstrates that the position-variable model, considering peripheral auditory system responses, successfully accounts for complex lateralization effects, including frequency-dependent reversals.
Key Insights:
- The position-variable model provides a robust explanation for unexpected auditory lateralization with gated noise stimuli.
- Low-frequency phase delay offers qualitative consistency with observed phenomena, unlike interaural group delay.
- Cross-correlation functions, while related, offer a less direct explanation for the observed perceptual biases.
Outlook:
- Further refinement of the position-variable model could enhance understanding of complex binaural processing.
- Investigating the role of peripheral auditory system responses in other anomalous auditory perception scenarios.
- Exploring the application of these findings to the design of auditory displays and hearing aids.