Apparent links between temporal tasks may be confounded by frequency selectivity

Evidence

It should be noted, however, that the positive correlation found for the TIME and HUGGINS tasks was due predominantly to the consistent age effect in the both tasks (see Fig. 1 ). When the effects of age were partialled out, the correlation coefficient was not significantly different from zero (r = − 0.24, p = 0.191), implying that the positive correlation was due to underlying non-temporal factors that are sensitive to aging. A candidate for such a factor is frequency selectivity. It has been argued that (intermediately) resolved frequency components of the SSMC could contribute to the performance of the TIME task (Micheyl et al. 2010 ). Peripheral frequency resolution could influence the representation of interaural correlation across a frequency axis, which is the basis for the Huggins pitch. Indeed, ERB was significantly correlated with thresholds for the TIME and HUGGINS tasks (ERB-TIME: r = 0.30, p = 0.047; ERB-HUGGINS: r = 0.35, p = 0.050; the effects of age were not partialled out). — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 1078

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s broader theme of aging and hearing, and to the role of peripheral frequency selectivity (ERB) in temporal processing — resonates with the account of the elderly-ears audiometric story in other chapters.