Sound localization: effects of reverberation time, speaker array, stimulus frequency, and stimulus rise/decay.
This research assessed the ability of human listeners to localize one-third octave noise bands in the horizontal plane. The effects of reverberation time (absorbent versus reverberant room), stimulus center frequency (500, 1000, 2000, and 4000 Hz), stimulus rise/decay time (5 vs 200 ms) and speaker array (frontal versus lateral) were investigated for four subjects using a forced-choice speaker-identification paradigm. Sound localization scores were consistently lower in the reverberant room than in the absorbent room. They also revealed strong frequency and azimuthal effects. The benefit of a shorter rise/decay time was small and limited to low frequencies. The identification of a speaker position depended strongly upon the array in which it was embedded, primarily because localization in the lateral array led to frequency-dependent front/back confusions and response bias. The results also illustrated the importance of choosing a coordinate system based on the auditory cone-of-confusion to analyze localization data for speaker arrays spanning the aural axis.
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Hearing Research Laboratory, Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute, Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
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D001307:Auditory Perception; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013017:Sound Localization