Power functions of loudness magnitude estimations and auditory brainstem evoked responses

Abstract

The correspondence between subjective and neural response to change in acoustic intensity was considered by deriving power functions from subjective loudness estimations and from the amplitude and latency of auditory brainstem evoked response components (BERI. Thirty-six subjects provided loudness magnitude estimations of 2-sec trains of positive polarity click stimuli, 20/sec, at intensity levels ranging from 55 to 90 dB in 5-dB steps. The loudness power function yielded an exponent of .48. With longer trains of the same click stimuli, the exponents of BER latency measures ranged from -.14 for wave I to -.03 for later waves. The exponents of BER amplitude-intensity functions ranged from .40 to .19. Although these exponents tended to be larger than exponents previously reported, they were all lower than the exponent derived from the subjective loudness estimates, and a clear correspondence between the exponents of the loudness and BER component intensity functions was not found.

Estimating loudness growth from tone-burst evoked responses

“…Several studies have attempted to find a relationship between ABR and loudness growth as a function of level ͑Pratt and Sohmer, 1977;Wilson and Stelmack, 1982;Babkoff and Pratt, 1984;Davidson et al, 1990;Serpanos et al, 1997;Gallego et al, 1999͒. ͑See Table I for a detailed summary.͒ A few patterns can be observed from the list of studies that investigated ABR and loudness growth.…”

Another look at the ‘new psychophysics’

“…The first proposal led Stevens (1970) to consider the neurophysiological evidence for the power law. Subsequently a good deal of research has been carried out examining the relationship between electrophysiological and psychophysical functions (Botte et al, 1975 ;Atkinson, 1982;Wilson & Stelmack, 1982). Much of the early electrophysiological work had been interpreted as consistent with Fechner's logarithmic law.…”

Cross-modality matching and the loudness growth function for click stimuli

“…While inconsistent data exist on the subjective loudness growth function for clicks ͑Cazals and Stephens, 1975;Davidson et al, 1990;Geisler et al, 1958;Pratt and Sohmer, 1977;Raab and Osman, 1962;Wilson and Stelmack, 1982͒, there is evidence that the loudness growth function obtained with clicks approximates the loudness function obtained with tonal stimuli ͑Cazals and Stephens, 1975;Geisler et al, 1958͒. However, there are no data available from CMM loudness studies that used clicks as stimuli; tones have been used in recent CMM studies ͑Ce-faratti and Zwislocki, 1994;Collins and Gescheider, 1989;Hellman and Meiselman, 1988.…”