The temporal course of simultaneous tone-on-tone masking.
Threshold for a 20-ms, 1-kHz signal was measured as a function of its temporal position within a longer duration gated masker; masker frequencies were below, at, and above 1 kHz. For a masker frequency above the signal frequency, there is a sizable temporal effect: As the onset of the signal is delayed, threshold decreases rapidly but then increases again as the signal approaches masker offset. Similar results can be observed for a masker frequency below the signal frequency, but that temporal effect is due to the detection of the cubic difference tone. The implication of this frequency-dependent temporal effect for measuring psychophysical tuning curves is discussed.
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D001307:Auditory Perception; D001309:Auditory Threshold; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008433:Mathematics; D008960:Models, Psychological; D013997:Time Factors