TY - JOUR
T1 - A behavioral measure of basilar-membrane nonlinearity in listeners with normal and impaired hearing
AU - Oxenham, Andrew J.
AU - Plack, Christopher J.
PY - 1997/6
Y1 - 1997/6
N2 - This paper examines the possibility of estimating basilar-membrane (BM) nonlinearity using a psychophysical technique. The level of a forward masker required to mask a brief signal was measured for conditions where the masker was either at, or one octave below, the signal frequency. The level of the forward masker at masked threshold provided an indirect measure of the BM response to the signal, as follows. Consistent with physiological studies, it was assumed that the BM responds linearly to frequencies well below the characteristic frequency (CF). Thus the ratio of the slopes of the masking functions between a masker at the signal frequency and a masker well below the signal frequency should provide an estimate of BM compression at CF. Results obtained from normally hearing listeners were in quantitative agreement with physiological estimates of BM compression. Furthermore, differences between normally hearing listeners and listeners with cochlear hearing impairment were consistent with the physiological effects of damage to the cochlea. The results support the hypothesis that BM nonlinearity governs the nonlinear growth of the upward spread of masking, and suggest that this technique provides a straightforward method for estimating BM nonlinearity in humans.
AB - This paper examines the possibility of estimating basilar-membrane (BM) nonlinearity using a psychophysical technique. The level of a forward masker required to mask a brief signal was measured for conditions where the masker was either at, or one octave below, the signal frequency. The level of the forward masker at masked threshold provided an indirect measure of the BM response to the signal, as follows. Consistent with physiological studies, it was assumed that the BM responds linearly to frequencies well below the characteristic frequency (CF). Thus the ratio of the slopes of the masking functions between a masker at the signal frequency and a masker well below the signal frequency should provide an estimate of BM compression at CF. Results obtained from normally hearing listeners were in quantitative agreement with physiological estimates of BM compression. Furthermore, differences between normally hearing listeners and listeners with cochlear hearing impairment were consistent with the physiological effects of damage to the cochlea. The results support the hypothesis that BM nonlinearity governs the nonlinear growth of the upward spread of masking, and suggest that this technique provides a straightforward method for estimating BM nonlinearity in humans.
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U2 - 10.1121/1.418327
DO - 10.1121/1.418327
M3 - Article
C2 - 9193054
AN - SCOPUS:0030982117
SN - 0001-4966
VL - 101
SP - 3666
EP - 3675
JO - Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
JF - Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
IS - 6
ER -