Forward masking reveals how the ear’s perceptual representation of sound decays over time

Evidence

To illustrate how two stimuli that do not overlap in time might be related to temporal processing, Figure 5–15 illustrates how the perceptual representation of the masker might decay and provide masking of a signal. This decay is illustrated by the dashed line. As the two stimuli are separated farther in time, the effect of the masker on the signal should decrease, and the signal will become easier to detect. In a forward masking experiment, the level of the signal needed for detection is typically measured as the dependent variable. The experimental, independent variable is the time between the masker and the signal. Thus, the signal threshold is measured as a function of the time delay between the masker and signal. In some ways, this paradigm is very similar to Plomp’s gap detection paradigm. However, rather than measuring the size of the just noticeable gap, we measure the threshold of a signal following a gap of a specified duration. — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1027

Categorization

• XREF: Similar to Plomp’s gap detection paradigm explicitly noted; both are temporal-resolution measures suitable for comparing normal vs impaired hearing.