Abstract
The on‐effect is the perceptual enhancement of one pure‐tone component of a multitone stimulus, created by an “amplitude notch” (abrupt reduction and restoration of amplitude) in the tone. Below a critical frequency separation (CFS) of components, the on‐effect is lost. This study investigated the relationship between the CFS for the on‐effect and the critical bandwidth (CBW) established in masking experiments. Subjects identified the direction of a series of amplitude notches in ascending or descending components of a multitone stimulus. Tones were spaced at fifteen levels of percent of CBW (65%–100%). When stimuli were adjusted for equal loudness, the CFS for on‐effect detection was a constant percentage of CBW in the range tested (100–4000 Hz). Furthermore, the CFS varied directly with loudness, i.e., the louder the stimulus the greater the CFS. These results suggest that the CBW depends on input intensity as well as input frequency. Whitfield [I. C. Whitfield, “The Neural Code,” in Handbook of Perception, edited by E. C. Carterette and M.P. Friedman (Academic Press, New York, 1978), Vol. IV] proposed a physiological model of pitch and intensity encoding consistent with these data.
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