Auditory Models

Abstract

Physical, analytical, descriptive, and computational auditory models have played a major role in revealing fundamental processes of hearing. These models have dealt with both psychophysical and physiological data. The major efforts to model auditory sensation and perception can be divided into three categories: physical and analytical models of the function of the cochlea (inner ear), analytical and descriptive models of auditory detection and discrimination, and computational models of auditory neural processing. Models of the cochlea seek to describe the biomechanical vibrations that take place in the inner ear leading to neural impulses in the auditory nerve that code for the frequency, level, and timing content of sound. Most models of detecting and discriminating among sounds are based on the Signal Detection Theory as applied to processing auditory signals in noise. The rapidly developing area of computational modeling provides many examples of models of neural processing related to topics ranging from modeling single neural elements to modeling phenomena such as pitch perception, sound localization, and auditory scene analysis. These auditory modeling efforts form key links between empirical studies of hearing and theories of auditory processing.