Noise-impaired listeners show reduced temporal integration, only 4 dB per decade

Evidence

The data for normally hear ing subjects correspond closely to those given in Sect. 4.4.1, and indicate an increment of about 10 dB for a factor of 10 reduction from 100 to 10 ms. Hearing-impaired listeners, however, show an increment in level of only about 4 dB over the same range of durations. This increment is much less than with normally hearing subjects, and leads to the fact that the difference between normally hearing and hearing-impaired listeners may even be as much as 10 dB at 3-ms duration. However, this does not mean that hearing-impaired listeners hear better at shorter durations than do normally hearing subjects. Rather, it means that the temporal integration in hearing-impaired listeneres is not developed as much as it is in normally hearing subjects. Very short tone bursts of 3-ms duration produce a relatively broad spectrum. Because many subjects with noise-induced hearing loss show elevated threshold above about 1.5 to 2.5 kHz, but have relatively normal sensitivity for frequencies below that, the spectral splatter of short duration bursts may influence their thresholds. — Professor Dr.-Ing. Hugo Fastl, Professor Dr.-Ing. Eberhard, Psychoacoustics- Facts and Models, 1948

Categorization

• QUESTION: The spectral splatter confound for short bursts in high-frequency-impaired listeners is intriguing - how are these data corrected, if at all, for normal low-frequency sensitivity?