Developmental changes in infants' sensitivity to octave-band noises

Trehub, Sandra E.; Schneider, Bruce A.; Endman, Maxine

doi:10.1016/0022-0965(80)90020-x

Cited by 147 publications

(123 citation statements)

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“…In general, both adult and infant threshold estimates were in good agreement with existing data. For 3OO-msec noise stimuli, infant thresholds averaged 15 dB above those of adults, well within the range of infant-adult differences reported in similar studies of auditory sensitivity during infancy (Olsho, Koch, Carter, Halpin, & Spetner, 1988;Trehub, Schneider, & Endman, 1980). For adult subjects, the difference in threshold for clicks and noise bursts was quite comparable in the two bandwidth conditions; mean click thresholds were 22.5 and 25 dB above noise-burst thresholds for broadband and filtered conditions, respectively.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 78%

Auditory temporal summation in infants and adults: Effects of stimulus bandwidth and masking noise

Berg

1991

Perception & Psychophysics

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A visually reinforced operant procedure was employed to determine the behavioral thresholds of 6-to 7-month-old infants and adults for stimuli of various bandwidths and durations. Experiment 1 compared absolute thresholds for broadband and '!.I-octave filtered clicks and 300-msec noise bursts. For adult subjects, the difference in threshold for clicks and noise bursts was quite comparable in the two bandwidth conditions, but infants' click-noise threshold differences were significantly larger for broadband than for Ill-octave stimuli. In Experiment 2, 2-point thresholdduration functions were compared for 4-kHz tones and octave-band noise bursts presented in backgrounds of quiet and continuous noise. Infants' threshold-duration function for octave-band noise bursts was significantly steeper than the comparable adult function in quiet, but not in masking noise. These results suggest that young infants may have particular difficulty detecting lowintensity broadband sounds when durations are very short.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 78%

Auditory temporal summation in infants and adults: Effects of stimulus bandwidth and masking noise

Berg

1991

Perception & Psychophysics

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“…Since effects ofleakage in the seal between the earphone cushion and pinna are more pronounced at low frequencies (Zwislocki et al, 1988), it is possible that acoustic leakage may have been a factor. Nevertheless, the general pattern of results was similar to findings previously reported for similar stimuli (Berg, 1991;Berg & Boswell, 1995;Trehub et al, 1980). Infants' thresholds were less mature for low-than for highfrequency noise, and less mature for shorter than for longer duration bursts at both low and high frequencies.…”

Section: Q2030405o80 Q2030405080supporting

confidence: 88%

“…For these subjects, mean threshold for 100-msec noise bursts in quiet was 30.4 dB SPL (SD = 4.9 dB), nearly 20 dB lower than thresholds obtained for the same stimuli presented via headphones in Experiment I, and very close to soundfield thresholds reported by Trehub et al (1980) for 400-Hz octave-band noise bursts. We therefore used soundfield presentation to determine noise-increment thresholds in two additional groups of infants for continuous standards of 50 and 60 dB SPL, or approximately 20 and 30 dB SL.…”

Section: Methodssupporting

confidence: 60%

“…The present investigation was designed to address this question by examining infants' ability to detect differences in intensity over a wider range of standard levels. Because previous work has demonstrated that the thresholds of6-to 7-month-old infants are significantly less mature at low than at mid and high frequencies (Olsho, Koch, Carter, Halpin, & Spetner, 1988;Trehub, Schneider, & Endman, 1980), we elected to compare discrimination performance for both 10w-and highfrequency noise bands. Under a number of conditions, thresholds are also less mature at short durations during infancy.…”

Section: Examined Dlsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Infants’ detection of increments in low- and high-frequency noise

Berg

Boswell

1998

Perception & Psychophysics

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Avisually reinforced operant paradigm was employed to examine the relationship between the difference limen (DL)for intensity and level of the standard during infancy.In Experiment 1, 7-month-old infants and adults detected increments in continuous noise presented via headphones at each of four levels ranging from 28 to 58 dB SPL. Noise stimuli were 2-octave bands centered at either 400 or 4000Hz, and increments were 10 and 100msec in duration. Infants' DLswere significantly larger than those of adult subjects and significantly larger for low-than for high-frequency stimuli. For the highfrequency noise band, infants' DLs were generally consistent with Weber's law, remaining essentially constant for standards higher than 28 dB SPL(3 dB SL)for 100-msecincrements and 38 dB SPL(13 dB SL)for lO-msecincrements. For low-frequency noise, infants' absolute thresholds were exceptionally high, and sensation levels ofthe standards were too low to adequately describe the relationship. In Experiment 2, 7-month-old infants detected 10-and 100-msec increments in 400-Hz noise stimuli presented in sound field. Infants' low-frequency DLswere large at low intensities and decreased with increases in level of the standard up to at least 30 dB SL. For both low-and high-frequency noise, the difference between DLsfor 10-and 100-msecincrements tended to be large at low levels of the standard and to decrease at higher levels. These results suggest that the relationship between the DLand levelof the standard varies with both stimulus frequencyand duration duringinfancy. However,stimulusdependent immaturities in increment detection may be most evident at levels within approximately 30 dB of absolute threshold.One ofthe most basic of auditory capacities is the ability to detect a change in the intensity or level ofan auditory stimulus. This ability has been widely studied in both normal and hearing-impaired adults, but little is known about discrimination of intensity differences in infants and young children. The few experiments examining this topic from a developmental perspective are consistent in showing poorer performance in young subjects. Sinnott and Aslin (1985) reported difference limens (DLs) ranging from 3 to 12 dB for a group of 7-to 9-month~old infants detecting increments in a constantly repeating 1-kHz tone presented at 60 dB SPL. By comparison, adult DLs obtained under identical conditions ranged from 1 to 2 dB. Bull, Eilers, and Oiler (1984) varied the intensity of individual synthetic syllables embedded within multi syllable wordlike units and found increment thresholds on the order of 2-6 dB in young infants; Schneider and Trehub (1985) reported similar estimates of2.5-5 dB for infants' detection of increments in continuous broadband noise. These values compare with DLs of less than 1 dB typically obtained in adult subjects for similar types of stimuli (see, e.g., Miller,

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“…Frequency resolution is like that in adults (Spetner & Olsho, 1990). Absolute sensitivity to sound is still somewhat poorer, but 6-month-olds' thresholds are only about 15 dB higher than adults' at frequencies above 2000 Hz (Olsho, Koch, Carter, Halpin, & Spetner, 1988;Trehub, Schneider, & Endman, 1980). Absolute sensitivity to low frequencies remains about 20 dB poorer than in adults and matures slowly during the remainder of infancy and into childhood.…”

Section: Increasing Specificity and Discovering Details In Complex Somentioning

confidence: 86%

Issues in human auditory development

Werner

2007

Journal of Communication Disorders

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The human auditory system is often portrayed as precocious in its development. In fact, many aspects of basic auditory processing appear to be adult-like by the middle of the first year of postnatal life. However, processes such as attention and sound source determination take much longer to develop. Immaturity of higher-level processes limits the processing of both simple and complex sounds by infants and children. Young listeners with impaired hearing may be at a particular disadvantage, in that they must make sense of sounds on the basis of a degraded representation using immature perceptual strategies.Learning outcomes-(1) Readers will be able to describe three stages of human auditory development. (2) Readers will be able to describe how experience with sound is important in auditory development. (3) Readers will be able to describe the role of attention and other higher-level processes in early audition.

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Developmental changes in infants' sensitivity to octave-band noises

Cited by 147 publications

References 7 publications

Auditory temporal summation in infants and adults: Effects of stimulus bandwidth and masking noise

Auditory temporal summation in infants and adults: Effects of stimulus bandwidth and masking noise

Infants’ detection of increments in low- and high-frequency noise

Issues in human auditory development

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