Auditory sensory storage in relation to the growth of sensation and acoustic information extraction.

Abstract

A brief, vivid phase of auditory sensory storage that outlasts the stimulus could be used in perception in two ways: First, all of the neural activity resulting from the stimulus, including that of the sensory store, could contribute to a sensation of growing loudness; second, the sensory store could permit the continued extraction of information about the sound's acoustic properties. This study includes a task for which these two processes lead to different predictions; a third prediction is based on the two processes combined. The task required loudness judgments for two brief tones presented with a variable intertone interval. The results of Experiments 1-3 were as one would expect if both the growth of sensation and information extraction contributed to the pattern of loudness judgments. Experiment 4 strengthened the two-process account by demonstrating the separability of the two processes. Approaches to mathematical modeling of these results are discussed.