Human interaural time difference thresholds for sine tones: The high-frequency limit

Abstract

[EN] The smallest detectable interaural time difference (ITD) for sine tones was measured for four human listeners to determine the dependence on tone frequency. At low frequencies, 250 700 Hz, threshold ITDs were approximately inversely proportional to tone frequency. At mid-frequencies, 700 1000 Hz, threshold ITDs were smallest. At high frequencies, above 1000 Hz, thresholds increased faster than exponentially with increasing frequency becoming unmeasurably high justabove 1400 Hz. A model for ITD detection began with a biophysically based computational model for a medial superior olive (MSO) neuron that produced robust ITD responses up to 1000 Hz, and demonstrated a dramatic reduction in ITD-dependence from 1000 to 1500 Hz. Rate-ITD functions from the MSO model became inputs to binaural display models both place based and rate-differ-ence based. A place-based, centroid model with a rigid internal threshold reproduced almost all fea- tures of the human data. A signal-detection version of this model reproduced the high-frequence divergence but badly underestimated low-frequency thresholds. A rate-difference model incorporat- ing fast contralateral inhibition reproduced the major features of the human threshold data except for the divergence. A combined, hybrid model could reproduce all the threshold data.