Information extraction from contralateral cues in the detection of signals of uncertain frequency

Abstract

Observers performed a monaural, yes–no detection task under conditions of signal frequency uncertainty. This frequency uncertainty could be reduced by use of a contralateral cue. The major cue types were a single-tone cue with the same frequency as the potential detection tone and a three-frequency cue with the potential signal frequency as the intermediate component. Performance obtained with a single-tone cue rivaled levels obtained when signal frequency was fixed over a block of trials. Performance with a three- frequency cue, requiring extraction of relevant frequency information, produced performance levels only slightly lower than the single-tone cue condition. Two major conclusions were drawn from the data: (1) The observer, utilizing the single-tone cue, can nearly eliminate the detrimental effects of signal frequency uncertainty. (2) The ’’hearing out’’ process used to extract relevant frequency information from the three-frequency cue is nearly complete. The relatively strong support for Ohm’s law obtained from this study may be due, in part, to the level of the auditory system tapped by the present task. Subject Classification: [43]65.50, [43]65.75, [43]65.54.