Complex interactions between pairs of forward maskers.
The present study was conducted to determine to what extent the combined effects of two forward maskers can be predicted from addition of their individual effects. The maskers were 50-Hz wide noise bands with center frequencies ranging from 1.8 to 2.2 kHz. The signal was a brief, 2.0-kHz tone burst. When the maskers were gated on and off together, the combination produced sometimes more and sometimes less masking than predicted depending on the particular pair and the relative amounts of masking produced by the individual members of the pair. The greatest discrepancy occurred, however, when the masker pair was presented simultaneously with the signal or when the forward maskers were presented in sequence. In the latter case, the obtained threshold exceeded the predicted threshold by as much as 34 dB.
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Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin, Madison 53705.
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001309:Auditory Threshold; D006801:Humans; D015233:Models, Statistical; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D011571:Psychoacoustics; D013997:Time Factors