Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Moving sound source discrimination in humans: Mismatch negativity and psychophysics

  • Published:
Human Physiology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The ability to discriminate moving sounds sources with different dynamic properties was studied in humans. Mismatch negativity was studied in an experiment on dichotic stimulation, with deviant stimuli simulating the instantaneous movement of the auditory image to the right or left of the head midline in the horizontal plane. Standard stimuli simulated continuous movement of the sound source to the right or to the left to the same angular distances. It was also established that both deviant stimuli caused mismatch negativity, its parameters being independent on the direction of sound movement. Psychophysical testing of the same group of subjects showed that discrimination between the stimuli was below the psychophysical threshold. The results obtained are discussed from the point of view of current theories of moving sound localization. The correlation between the objective and subjective levels of discrimination of moving auditory images are discussed.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Altman, Ya.A., Lokalizatsiya dvizhushchegosya istochnika zvuka (Localization of a Moving Sound Source), Leningrad: Nauka, 1983.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Grantham, D.W., Hornsby, B.W., and Erpenbeck, E.A., Auditory Spatial Resolution in Horizontal, Vertical and Diagonal Planes, J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 2003, vol. 114, p. 1009.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Perrott, D.R. and Musicant, A.D., Minimum Auditory Movement Angle: Binaural Localization of Moving Sound Sources, J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 1977, vol. 62, p. 1463.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Grantham D.W., Auditory Motion Perception: Snapshots Revisited, in Binaural and Spatial Hearing in Real and Virtual Environments, Gilkey, R.H. and Anderson, T.R., Eds., New York: Erlbaum, 1997, p. 295.

    Google Scholar 

  5. Paavilainen, P., Karlsson, M.L., Reinikainen, K., and Näätänen, R., Mismatch Negativity to Change in Spatial Location of an Auditory Stimulus, EEG Clin. Neurophysiol., 1989, vol. 73, p. 129.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Nager, W., Kohlmetz, C., Joppich, G., Mobes, J., and Munte, T.F., Tracking of Multiple Sound Sources Defined by Interaural Time Differences: Brain Potential Evidence in Human, Neurosci. Lett., 2003, vol. 344, p. 181.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Deouell, L.Y., Parnes, A., Pickard, N., and Knight, R.T., Spatial Location Is Accurately Tracked by Human Auditory Sensory Memory: Evidence from the Mismatch Negativity, Eur. J. Neurosci., 2006, vol. 24, p. 1488.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Colin, C., Radeau, M., Soquet, A., Dachy, B., and Deltenre, P., Electrophysiology of Spatial Scene Analysis: The Mismatch Negativity (MMN) Is Sensitive to the Ventriloquism Illusion, Clin. Neurophysiol., 2002, vol. 113, p. 507.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Altman, J.A., Vaitulevich, S.F., Shestopalova, L.B., and Varfolomeev, A.L., Mismatch Negativity Evoked by Stationary and Moving Auditory Images of Different Azimuthal Positions, Neurosci. Lett., 2005, vol. 384, p. 330.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Altman, Ya.A., Vaitulevich, S.F., Varfolomeev, A.L., Petropavlovskaya, E.A., and Shestopalova, L.B., Mismatch Negativity as a Characteristic of the Distinguishing Locating Capacity of the Human Auditory System, Fiziol. Chel., 2007, vol. 33, no. 5, p. 22 [Hum. Physiol. (Engl. Transl.), 2007, vol. 33, no. 5, p. 531].

    Google Scholar 

  11. Altman, Ya.A., Vaitulevich, S.F., Varfolomeev, A.L., and Shestopalova, L.B., Mismatch Negativity during Exposure to Acoustic Stimuli Simulating Fused Auditory Images, Fiziol. Chel., 2004, vol. 30, no. 1, p. 70 [Hum. Physiol. (Engl. Transl.), 2004, vol. 30, no. 1, p. 61].

    Google Scholar 

  12. Schröger, E., Interaural Time and Level Differences: Integrated or Separated Processing?, Hearing Res., 1996, vol. 96, p. 191.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Schröger, E. and Wolff, C., Fast Pre-Attentive Processing of Location: A Functional Basis for Selective Listening, Neurosci. Lett., 1997, vol. 232, p. 5.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  14. Schröger, E. and Wolff, C., Mismatch Response of the Human Brain to Changes in Sound Location, Neuroreport, 1996, vol. 7, no. (18), p. 3005.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. Shestopalova, L.B. and Vaitulevich, S.F.,Effect of the Azimuthal Positions of Motionless and Moving Sound Sources on the Mismatch Negativity Phenomenon, Ross. Fiziol. Zh. im. I.M. Sechenova, 2004, vol. 90, no. 9, p. 1084.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Shestopalova, L.B., Vaitulevich, S.F., Varfolomeev, A.L., and Petropavlovskaya, E.A., Mismatch Negativity in Auditory Evoked Potentials in the Cases of Continuous and Saltatory Movements of a Vitrual Sound Source, Ross. Fiziol. Zh. im. I.M. Sechenova, 2007, vol. 93, no. 7, p. 777.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  17. Pakarinen, S., Takegata, R., Rinne, T., Huotilainen, M., and Näätänen, R., Measurement of Extensive Auditory Discrimination Profiles Using the Mismatch Negativity (MMN) of the Auditory Event-Related Potential (ERP), Clin. Neurophysiol., 2007, vol. 118, p. 177.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Näätänen, R., Paavilainen, P., Rinne, T., and Alho, K., The Mismatch Negativity (MMN) in Basic Research of Central Auditory Processing: A Review, Clin. Neurophysiol., 2007, vol. 118, p. 2544.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  19. Kujala, T., Tervaniemi, M., and Schröger, E., The Mismatch Negativity in Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience: Theoretical and Methodological Considerations, Biol. Psychol., 2007, vol. 74, p. 1.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Altman, J.A., Are the Neurons Detecting Direction of Sound Source Motion?, Exp. Neurol., 1968, vol. 22, p. 13.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Altman, J.A., Syka, J., and Schmigidina, G.N., Neuronal Activity in the Medial Geniculate Body of the Cat During Monaural and Binaural Stimulation, Exp. Brain Res., 1970, vol. 10, no. 1, p. 81.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  22. Ahissar, M., Ahissar, E., Bergman, H., and Vaadia, E., Encoding of Sound Source Location and Movement: Activity of Single Neurons and Interactions between Adjacent Neurons in the Monkey Auditory Cortex, J. Neurophysiol., 1992, vol. 67, p. 203.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  23. Yin, T.C. and Kuwada, S., Binaural Interaction in Low-Frequency Neurons in Inferior Colliculus of the Cat, J. Neurophysiol., 1983, vol. 50, no. 4, p. 981.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  24. Perrott, D.R., Costantino, B., and Ball, J., Discrimination of Moving Events which Accelerate or Decelerate over the Listening Interval, J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 1993, vol. 93, p. 1053.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  25. Sams, M., Paavilainen, P., Alho, K., and Näätänen, R., Auditory Frequency Discrimination and EventRelated Potentials, EEG Clin. Neurophysiol., 1985, vol. 62, p. 437.

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  26. Tiitinen, H., May, P., Reinikainen, K., and Näätänen, R., Attentive Novelty Detection in Humans Is Governed by Pre-Attentive Sensory Memory, Nature, 1994, vol. 370, p. 90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Novitski, N., Tervaniemi, M., Huotilainen, M., and Näätänen, R., Frequency Discrimination at Different Frequency Levels as Indexed by Electrophysiological and Behavioral Measures, Cogn. Brain Res., 2004, vol. 20, p. 26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Desjardins, R.N., Trainor, L.J., Hevenor, S.J., and Polak, C.P., Using Mismatch Negativity to Measure Auditory Temporal Resolution Thresholds, Neuroreport, 1999, vol. 10, p. 2079.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  29. Kujala, T., Kallio, J., Tervaniemi, M., and Näätänen, R., The Mismatch Negativity as an Index of Temporal Processing in Audition, Clin. Neurophysiol., 2001, vol. 112, p. 1712.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  30. Baldeweg, T., Richardson, A., Watkins, S., Foale, C., and Gruzelier, J., Impaired Auditory Frequency Discrimination in Dyslexia Detected with Mismatch Evoked Potentials, Ann. Neurol., 1999, vol. 45, p. 495.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  31. Bradlow, A.R., Kraus, N., Nicol, T.G., McGee, T.J., Cunningham, J., and Zecker, S.G., Effects of Lengthened Formant Transition Duration on Discrimination and Neural Representation of Synthetic CV Syllables by Normal and Learning-Disabled Children, J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 1999, vol. 106, p. 2086.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  32. Jaramillo, M., Ilvonen, T., Kujala, T., Alku, P., Tervaniem, M., and Alho, K., Are Different Kinds of Acoustic Features Processed Differently for Speech and Non-Speech Sounds?, Cognitive Brain Res., 2001, vol. 12, p. 459.

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  33. Savela, J., Kujala, T., Tuomainen, J., Ek, M., Aaltonen, O., and Näätänen, R., The Mismatch Negativity and Reaction Time as Indices of the Perceptual Distance between the Corresponding Vowels of Two Related Languages, Cognitive Brain Res., 2003, vol. 16, p. 250.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  34. Tervaniemi, M., Just, V., Koelsch, S., Widmann, A., and Schröger, E., Pitch-Discrimination Accuracy in Musicians vs. Non-Musicians: An Event-Related Potential and Behavioral Study, Exp. Brain Res., 2005, vol. 161, p. 1.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  35. Bertoli, S., Heimberg, S., Smurzynski, J., and Probst, R., Mismatch Negativity and Psychoacoustic Measures of Gap Detection in Normally Hearing Subjects, Psychophysiology, 2001, vol. 38, p. 334.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  36. Dalebout, S. and Stack, J., Mismatch Negativity to Acoustic Differences not Differentiated Behaviorally, J. Am. Acad. Audiol., 1999, vol. 10, p. 388.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Pavlov Institute of Physiology, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, 199034, Russia

    Yu. A. Vasilenko & L. B. Shestopalova

Authors
  1. Yu. A. Vasilenko
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. L. B. Shestopalova
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Additional information

Original Russian Text © Yu.A. Vasilenko, L.B. Shestopalova, 2010, published in Fiziologiya Cheloveka, 2010, Vol. 36, No. 2, pp. 23–31.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Vasilenko, Y.A., Shestopalova, L.B. Moving sound source discrimination in humans: Mismatch negativity and psychophysics. Hum Physiol 36, 139–146 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0362119710020039

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1134/S0362119710020039

Key words

Search

Navigation