Year: 1983
Type: article
Abstract: The psychophysical masking of one tone by another has been attributed to the pattern of mechanical events produced in the cochlea by the two tones. To evaluate that possibility, we compared the patterns of synchronized discharges of chinchilla auditory nerve fibers elicited by tone pairs to tone-on-tone masking patterns previously obtained behaviorally in the same species. The contributions of a 1000-Hz masker (F1), various probe tones (f2), and the distortion products f2−f1 and 2f1−f2 to the synchronized responses were determined from period histograms. A “masked threshold” for each fiber was derived from plots of synchronized rate versus the level of f2. The pattern of fiber masked thresholds versus f2 for the most sensitive fibers resembled the masking pattern obtained behaviorally. Thresholds for cochlear distortion products also resembled the behavioral thresholds, lending support to the suggestion that notches in the masking pattern indicate detection of aural distortion products. The neural data do not reproduce the behavioral data in all respects. However, the data suggest that the general form of the masking pattern is determined peripherally and that psychophysical masking and physiological two-tone suppression are closely related. [Supported by NIH.]
DOI: 10.1121/1.2020576
Authors: D. G. Sinex, D. C. Havey, F. A. Boettcher
Institution: Central Institute for the Deaf
Language: English
Subfield: Sensory Systems
Field: Neuroscience
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2035162340