How well do measures of the precedence effect based on clicks predict performance for long-duration stimuli?

Abstract

Despite multiple reflections off nearby surfaces, listeners often localize sound sources based primarily upon the first arriving, direct sound. This is called the precedence effect. Much has been learned about the precedence effect using transient clicks, but the vast majority of everyday sounds are relatively long in duration. Recently, Pastore and Braasch (JASA, 2015) tested the effects of increased lag intensity on localization dominance for longer, 200-ms duration stimuli with 20-ms cosine-squared ramps. Assuming that interactions at the onset of lead-lag stimuli are primarily responsible for the precedence effect, it has been suggested that the binaural cues important to the precedence mechanism are the same for clicks and longer-duration noise stimuli. To test this hypothesis, we presented lead-lag stimuli composed of 1-ms, rectangular clicks, as well as 41-ms and the previously used 200-ms long noise bursts. Five, lead-lag delays between 1 and 5 ms were tested for lead/lag level differences of 0-, ...