Recognition and classification of noise signals by dolphins under conditions of noise interference and spatial uncertainty of their simultaneous presentation

Abstract

The ability of dolphin`s auditory system to recognize and classify noise signals according to certain invariant features under the influence of noise interference and spatial uncertainty of their simultaneous presentation was studied. The bottlenose dolphins trained to differentiate such signals had to solve this problem under conditions simulating real marine ones, when the perception of a useful signal occurs against the background of similar signals and noise interference. First, the noise signals were sequentially presented to the animal against the background of white masking noise. Further the dolphin had to identify a signal of a positive class from several simultaneously sounding sound sources. The efficiency of the animal was evaluated at several given levels of noise interference. In this case, the actual noise interference was both white noise and simultaneously sounding negative signals. It`s shown that the efficiency and noise immunity of dolphin`s auditory system depend on the degree of alternativeness of the spatial uncertainty of the simultaneous presentation of signals.