Influence of Event Duration and Impact Intensity on the Auditory Perception of Contact Severity

ABSTRACT

Previous research suggests that individuals can use sound to identify events, such as the approach of an object. It has been argued that the change in intensity over time (represented as τ, tau) has the potential to be informative about when a target will arrive at the point of observation. The change in τ (or $\dot{\tau }$, tau dot) refers to the change in speed of an approaching object and, thus, is believed to provide information about the severity of a collision between two objects. An object decelerating at an insufficient rate will make hard contact with an object in its path, while sufficient deceleration will result in soft or no contact. With respect to audition, the change in sound intensity is informative about an object’s speed of approach and the forcefulness of a collision. The present study seeks to examine the extent to which participant perception of collision severity was affected by variations in the duration of the pre-collision event and by variations in the sound intensity associated with collision. The findings reveal participant judgments were significantly affected by variations of both factors, though variations in collision-related sound intensity had a greater impact. While the authors provide a number of reasons for why the results of the present study should be tentatively considered, it is believed tau dot, as currently considered, is incapable of explaining the perception of collision when relying solely on sound. The authors argue that modification of the $\dot{\tau }$ formula is necessary.

KEYWORDS:

• Auditory perception
• intensity
• duration
• collision
• severity

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).