Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry.
Binaural pitch diplacusis refers to a perceptual anomaly whereby the same sound is perceived as having a different pitch depending on whether it is presented in the left or the right ear. Results in the literature suggest that this phenomenon is more prevalent, and larger, in individuals with asymme...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2016-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS ONE |
| Online Access: | http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4990190?pdf=render |
| _version_ | 1819018397676994560 |
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| author | David Colin Christophe Micheyl Anneline Girod Eric Truy Stéphane Gallégo |
| author_facet | David Colin Christophe Micheyl Anneline Girod Eric Truy Stéphane Gallégo |
| author_sort | David Colin |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Binaural pitch diplacusis refers to a perceptual anomaly whereby the same sound is perceived as having a different pitch depending on whether it is presented in the left or the right ear. Results in the literature suggest that this phenomenon is more prevalent, and larger, in individuals with asymmetric hearing loss than in individuals with symmetric hearing. However, because studies devoted to this effect have thus far involved small samples, the prevalence of the effect, and its relationship with interaural asymmetries in hearing thresholds, remain unclear. In this study, psychometric functions for interaural pitch comparisons were measured in 55 subjects, including 12 normal-hearing and 43 hearing-impaired participants. Statistically significant pitch differences between the left and right ears were observed in normal-hearing participants, but the effect was usually small (less than 1.5/16 octave, or about 7%). For the hearing-impaired participants, statistically significant interaural pitch differences were found in about three-quarters of the cases. Moreover, for about half of these participants, the difference exceeded 1.5/16 octaves and, in some participants, was as large as or larger than 1/4 octave. This was the case even for the lowest frequency tested, 500 Hz. The pitch differences were weakly, but significantly, correlated with the difference in hearing thresholds between the two ears, such that larger threshold asymmetries were statistically associated with larger pitch differences. For the vast majority of the hearing-impaired participants, the direction of the pitch differences was such that pitch was perceived as higher on the side with the higher (i.e., 'worse') hearing thresholds than on the opposite side. These findings are difficult to reconcile with purely temporal models of pitch perception, but may be accounted for by place-based or spectrotemporal models. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-21T03:18:46Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-45a9f705db4d4392a402e1ccfb540afb |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1932-6203 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-21T03:18:46Z |
| publishDate | 2016-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS ONE |
| spelling | doaj.art-45a9f705db4d4392a402e1ccfb540afb2022-12-21T19:17:45ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032016-01-01118e015997510.1371/journal.pone.0159975Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry.David ColinChristophe MicheylAnneline GirodEric TruyStéphane GallégoBinaural pitch diplacusis refers to a perceptual anomaly whereby the same sound is perceived as having a different pitch depending on whether it is presented in the left or the right ear. Results in the literature suggest that this phenomenon is more prevalent, and larger, in individuals with asymmetric hearing loss than in individuals with symmetric hearing. However, because studies devoted to this effect have thus far involved small samples, the prevalence of the effect, and its relationship with interaural asymmetries in hearing thresholds, remain unclear. In this study, psychometric functions for interaural pitch comparisons were measured in 55 subjects, including 12 normal-hearing and 43 hearing-impaired participants. Statistically significant pitch differences between the left and right ears were observed in normal-hearing participants, but the effect was usually small (less than 1.5/16 octave, or about 7%). For the hearing-impaired participants, statistically significant interaural pitch differences were found in about three-quarters of the cases. Moreover, for about half of these participants, the difference exceeded 1.5/16 octaves and, in some participants, was as large as or larger than 1/4 octave. This was the case even for the lowest frequency tested, 500 Hz. The pitch differences were weakly, but significantly, correlated with the difference in hearing thresholds between the two ears, such that larger threshold asymmetries were statistically associated with larger pitch differences. For the vast majority of the hearing-impaired participants, the direction of the pitch differences was such that pitch was perceived as higher on the side with the higher (i.e., 'worse') hearing thresholds than on the opposite side. These findings are difficult to reconcile with purely temporal models of pitch perception, but may be accounted for by place-based or spectrotemporal models.http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4990190?pdf=render |
| spellingShingle | David Colin Christophe Micheyl Anneline Girod Eric Truy Stéphane Gallégo Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. PLoS ONE |
| title | Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. |
| title_full | Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. |
| title_fullStr | Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. |
| title_full_unstemmed | Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. |
| title_short | Binaural Diplacusis and Its Relationship with Hearing-Threshold Asymmetry. |
| title_sort | binaural diplacusis and its relationship with hearing threshold asymmetry |
| url | http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4990190?pdf=render |
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