Chapter 10 Summary

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1. Listeners use small differences, in time and intensity, across the two ears to learn the direction in the plane (azimuth) from which a sound comes.
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2. Time and intensity differences across the two ears are not sufficient to fully indicate the location from which a sound comes. In particular, they are not enough to indicate whether sounds come from , or from higher or lower (elevation).
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3. The , ear canal, head, and torso alter the intensities of different frequencies for sounds coming from different places in space, and listeners use these changes in intensity across frequency to identify the location from which a sound comes.
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4. Perception of auditory distance is similar to perception of visual because no single characteristic of the signal can inform a listener about how distant a sound source is. Listeners must combine intensity, spectral composition, and relative amounts of direct and reflected energy of sounds to estimate distance to a sound source.
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5. Many natural sounds, including music and human speech, have rich harmonic structure with energy at integer multiples of the , and listeners are especially good at perceiving the pitch of harmonic sounds.
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6. Important perceptual qualities of complex sounds are (conveyed by the relative amounts of energy at different frequencies) and the onset and offset properties of attack and decay, respectively.
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7. Because the sounds in the environment are summed into a single waveform that reaches each ear, a major challenge for hearing is to separate sound sources in the combined signal. This general process is known as auditory analysis. Sound source segregation succeeds by using multiple characteristics of sounds, including spatial location, similarity in frequency and timbre, onset properties, and familiarity.
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8. In everyday environments, sounds to which a person is listening often are interrupted by other, louder sounds. Perceptual is a process by which missing or degraded acoustic signals are perceptually replaced.
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9. Auditory attention has many aspects in common with attention. It is a balance between being able to make use of sounds one needs to hear in the midst of competing sounds, and being on alert for new auditory information.
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