IUBio

Fw: How do Humans Perceive Simultaneous Sounds?

Ron Blue rcb5 at MSN.COM
Wed Mar 24 17:07:41 EST 1999


-----Original Message-----
From: John Segrave <segravej at R_E_M_O_V_E.tcd.ie>
To: audiolog at net.bio.net <audiolog at net.bio.net>
Date: Wednesday, March 24, 1999 12:08 PM
Subject: How do Humans Perceive Simultaneous Sounds?


>Hi,
>
>I am a final year computer science student in Ireland.  My research thesis
>is to develop a program that lets musicians play music together across a
>computer network (not the internet unfortunately!).
>
>One question I have been unable to answer is this (I hope this is within the
>domain of audiology!):
>What is the longest time delay you can have between two different sounds
>starting, such that the ear still thinks they started simultaneously?
>
>For example:  If a guitar player and a drummer are sitting in a room and
>they start playing a tune, then the ear should perceive them to be in sync.
>(even though there is a short time delay before the sound waves from the
>guitar reach the drummers ears, and vice-versa).
>
>However, if the drummer and the guitar player were very far away from each
>other, that delay would be much longer.  So how long would the delay need to
>be before they can no longer play together?  (because the delay is messing
>up their ability to be in sync).
>
>I have tried to perform some simple tests at home, and have arrived at a
>rough figure of about 30 milliseconds, but I am no audiologist!!  I was
>hoping someone in this newsgroup might know something about this aspect of
>human hearing.  Maybe someone could suggest a book that deals with this kind
>of topic?
>
>I have searched the web, but have found nothing so far.  Any help you can
>offer would be very much appreciated.
>Thanks!
>
>John Segrave
>segravej at tcd.ie
>
>
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