Perceptual Overestimation of Rising Intensity: Is Stimulus Continuity Necessary?

Abstract

A "perceptual bias for rising intensity" (Neuhoff 1998, Nature 395 123-124) is not dependent on the continuous change of a dynamic, looming sound source. Thirty participants were presented with pairs of 500 ms steady-state sounds corresponding to onset and offset levels of previously used dynamic increasing- and decreasing-intensity stimuli. Independent variables, intensity-change direction (increasing, decreasing), intensity region (high: 70-90 dB SPL, low: 50-70 dB SPL), interstimulus interval (ISI) (0 s, 1.8 s, 3.6 s), and timbre (vowel, violin) were manipulated as a fully within-subjects design. The dependent variable was perceived loudness change between each stimulus item in a pair. It was hypothesised that (i) noncontinuous increases of intensity are overestimated in loudness change, relative to decreases, in both low-intensity and high-intensity regions; and (ii) perceptual overestimation does not occur when end-levels are balanced. The hypotheses were partially supported. At the high-intensity region, increasing stimuli were perceived to change more in loudness than decreasing-intensity stimuli. At the low-intensity region and under balanced end-level conditions, decreasing-intensity stimuli were perceived to change more in loudness than increasing-intensity stimuli. A significant direction x region interaction varied as a function of ISI. Methodological, sensory, and cognitive explanations for overestimation in certain circumstances are discussed.

Effects of stimulus order on auditory distance discrimination of virtual nearby sound sources

“…This finding is most likely related to the previously mentioned results on perception of loudness change by Olsen and Stevens, 4 and supports our initial hypothesis. A further difference between the results of the two groups is that the interaction between direction and stimulus order is non-significant for the FIX group (F(1, 19) thresholds for lateral sources than medial sources in the approaching order.…”

Musical Expertise and the Ability to Imagine Loudness

“…The extent to which loudness, a perceptual correlate of intensity [1], [2], [3], [4], is represented in imagery is the focus of this study. Loudness is of particular relevance to the dynamic nature of sound because of the significance loudness change has in both environmental [5] and musical contexts [6]. Imagining previously encountered sounds involves reconstructing a mental representation of them from information stored in memory, and while it is unclear whether loudness is a part of the memory trace for a single auditory event [7], perhaps a change in loudness is part of the memory trace of a sequence of events.…”

End level bias on direct loudness ratings of increasing sounds

“…A significant number of studies have recently investigated the loudness of sounds that increase and decrease continuously in level (Neuhoff, 1998(Neuhoff, , 2001Canévet et al, 2003;Teghtsoonian et al, 2005;Susini et al, 2007;Olsen et al, 2010;Olsen and Stevens, 2010). This question is important for the study of moving sources for example, as intensity change is the dominant motion cue for mediating the effects of approaching sound sources (Bach et al, 2009).…”

“…Therefore, in order to examine these assumptions, direct and indirect ratings of loudness change, as well as direct ratings of global loudness were compared in a similar experimental setup in the present study. Neuhoff (2001), Olsen et al (in press) and Olsen and Stevens (2010) used paired comparisons to compare loudness change of upramps and downramps. In the other studies cited in this introduction, a single stimulus was evaluated in one trial.…”