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Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology

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01-12-2018 | Research Article

Effects of Masker Envelope Fluctuations on the Temporal Effect

Authors: Skyler G. Jennings, Kayla Sivas, Caitlin Stone

Published in: Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology | Issue 6/2018

ABSTRACT

Under certain conditions, detection thresholds in simultaneous masking improve when the onset of a short sinusoidal probe is delayed from the onset of a long masker. This improvement, known as the temporal effect, is largest for broadband maskers and is smaller or absent for narrowband maskers centered on the probe frequency. This study tests the hypothesis that small or absent temporal effects for narrowband maskers are due to the inherent temporal envelope fluctuations of Gaussian noise. Temporal effects were measured for narrowband noise maskers with fluctuating (“fluctuating maskers”) and flattened (“flattened maskers”) temporal envelopes as a function of masker level (Exp. I) and in the presence of fluctuating and flattened precursors (Exp. II). The temporal effect was absent for fluctuating narrowband maskers and as large as ~ 7 dB for flattened narrowband maskers. The AC-coupled power of the temporal envelopes of precursors and maskers accounted for 94 % of the variance in probe detection thresholds measured with fluctuating and flattened precursors and maskers. These results suggest that masker temporal envelope fluctuations contribute to the temporal effect and should be considered in future modeling efforts.

For Exp. 1, subject S2 was unable to return to complete a fourth adaptive track on one condition with a standard deviation greater than 5 dB; thus, data for this subject are the average of the original three adaptive tracks.

A 2-ms overlap between precursor and masker ramps eliminated audible gaps/transients for all conditions except for flattened precursors followed by flattened maskers. A rapid shift in the fine structure occurring at the junction of the low-noise noise precursor and low-noise noise masker sometimes resulted in an audible transient. To rectify this, a long low-noise noise stimulus with a duration equal to the combined duration of the precursor and masker was generated instead of generating separate precursors and maskers. This solution was possible because the levels and spectra of the precursors and maskers were equivalent.

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Title: Effects of Masker Envelope Fluctuations on the Temporal Effect
Authors: Skyler G. Jennings
Kayla Sivas
Caitlin Stone
Publication date: 01-12-2018
Publisher: Springer US
Published in: Journal of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology / Issue 6/2018
Print ISSN: 1525-3961
Electronic ISSN: 1438-7573
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10162-018-00688-x

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Effects of Masker Envelope Fluctuations on the Temporal Effect

ABSTRACT

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ABSTRACT

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