Loudness

Self Cite

Preliminary data [M. Epstein and M. Florentine, Ear. Hear. 30, 234-237 (2009)] obtained using speech stimuli from a visually present talker heard via loudspeakers in a sound-attenuating chamber indicate little difference in loudness when listening with one or two ears (i.e., significantly reduced binaural loudness summation, BLS), which is known as "binaural loudness constancy." These data challenge current understanding drawn from laboratory measurements that indicate a tone presented binaurally is louder than the same tone presented monaurally. Twelve normal listeners were presented recorded spondees, monaurally and binaurally across a wide range of levels via earphones and a loudspeaker with and without visual cues. Statistical analyses of binaural-to-monaural ratios of magnitude estimates indicate that the amount of BLS is significantly less for speech presented via a loudspeaker with visual cues than for stimuli with any other combination of test parameters (i.e., speech presented via earphones or a loudspeaker without visual cues, and speech presented via earphones with visual cues). These results indicate that the loudness of a visually present talker in daily environments is little affected by switching between binaural and monaural listening. This supports the phenomenon of binaural loudness constancy and underscores the importance of ecological validity in loudness research.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

Binaural loudness summation for speech presented via earphones and loudspeaker with and without visual cues

Epstein

Florentine

2012

Self Cite

“…Loudness is generally defined as the perceived magnitude of a sound that primarily changes with intensity (Florentine, 2011). Here, "primarily" is a key adjective, since loudness is also affected by other physical dimensions such as duration, frequency, and bandwidth (for review, Jesteadt and Leibold, 2011).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of relative and absolute frequency in the spectral weighting of loudness

Joshi

Wróblewski

Schmid

et al. 2016

The loudness of broadband sound is often modeled as a linear sum of specific loudness across frequency bands. In contrast, recent studies using molecular psychophysical methods suggest that low and high frequency components contribute more to the overall loudness than mid frequencies. In a series of experiments, the contribution of individual components to the overall loudness of a tone complex was assessed using the molecular psychophysical method as well as a loudness matching task. The stimuli were two spectrally overlapping ten-tone complexes with two equivalent rectangular bandwidth spacing between the tones, making it possible to separate effects of relative and absolute frequency. The lowest frequency components of the "low-frequency" and the "high-frequency" complexes were 208 and 808 Hz, respectively. Perceptual-weights data showed emphasis on lowest and highest frequencies of both the complexes, suggesting spectraledge related effects. Loudness matching data in the same listeners confirmed the greater contribution of low and high frequency components to the overall loudness of the ten-tone complexes. Masked detection thresholds of the individual components within the tone complex were not correlated with perceptual weights. The results show that perceptual weights provide reliable behavioral correlates of relative contributions of the individual frequency components to overall loudness of broadband sounds.

“…Loudness as the primary perceptual correlate of the level of a stimulus also changes with other physical stimulus properties (see, e.g., Florentine, 2011). One of these properties is the stimulus bandwidth.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Loudness of sounds with a subcritical bandwidth: A challenge to current loudness models?

Hots

Rennies

Verhey

2013

Level differences at equal loudness were measured for bandpass noises centered at 1.5 kHz with bandwidths from 5 to 405 Hz and a 1.5-kHz pure tone. Irrespective of the reference (tone or 135-Hz wide noise), the data indicate a decrease in loudness with increasing bandwidth. This is at odds with the assumption of stationary loudness models that loudness for sounds with a subcritical bandwidth is determined by the intensity and center frequency only. It is also not in agreement with dynamic loudness models, which predict higher levels for a tone than for equally loud noises, i.e., the opposite effect