Masked-threshold shape is nonlinear and level-dependent, steepening only at low masker levels.

Evidence

All masked thresholds show a very steep rise from low to higher frequencies before the maximum masking is reached. The slope of this rise seems to be independent of the level of the noise masker, and the maximum always is reached 3 dB below the level of the masking noise. Beyond the maximum, the masked thresholds decay towards lower levels quite quickly for low and medium masker levels. At higher masker levels, however, the slope towards high frequencies becomes increasingly shallow. Therefore, the frequency dependence of the masked threshold is level-dependent or nonlinear. — Professor Dr.-Ing. Hugo Fastl, Professor Dr.-Ing. Eberhard, Psychoacoustics- Facts and Models, 421

Categorization

Category: Factual Claims

Related

• The masked threshold’s high-frequency slope steepness depends on masker level (similarity 0.95)
• Beyond threshold, masker and signal levels rise one-for-one in decibels (similarity 0.90)
• Masked threshold rise toward high frequencies is about 100 dB per octave. (similarity 0.88)
• Masked threshold rises once noise bandwidth exceeds the critical bandwidth (similarity 0.88)
• Noise bandwidth below the critical band does not raise masked threshold. (similarity 0.88)
• Masking measurements require noise slopes steeper than the ear’s own selectivity (similarity 0.88)
• Masking pattern shapes differ by center frequency even at equal masker level (similarity 0.87)
• Noise-burst masked thresholds rise more gradually than tone-burst thresholds with shorter duration (similarity 0.87)
• Louder maskers increasingly mask high frequencies over low ones. (similarity 0.86)
• Masked threshold always exceeds quiet threshold except when masker and test frequencies differ greatly (similarity 0.86)
• Near threshold, masked threshold depends on both masker level and threshold-in-quiet via internal noise (similarity 0.86)
• Reducing audible fluctuations in a masker lowers post-masked thresholds by up to 24 dB (similarity 0.86)
• White noise masking of tones is linear but frequency-dependent above 500 Hz (similarity 0.86)
• Tonal masker spread inverts from low to high frequencies as masker level rises (similarity 0.86)
• Only tones exceeding a level-dependent masked threshold are audible in noise (similarity 0.86)