Detection of test pulses based on loudness that were presented before or after a periodic sequence of masking pulses

We looked for manifestations of the masking of the loudness of single pulses of a sequence with repetition periods T from a range of 20 - 150 ms. The test was the first or last pulse of the sequence of 12 similar narrowband pulses. The period T and the level of the test pulse were varied to determine the threshold for its detection and the minimum repetition period Tmin at which its detection is possible. For the period Tmin, the threshold shift dIso was determined as the difference between the detection thresholds for masked and single pulses. It was believed that the Tmin and dIso characterized the temporal resolution of the loudness and the changes in the loudness of the test pulse under masking. The indicators Tmin and dIso were compared with the indicators of the temporal summation of pulse sequences in listeners with normal hearing (the first group) and cochlear losses (the second group). The Tmin and dIso indicators of the first group of listeners correlated with the summation indicators: the higher the summation, the greater were the Tmin and dIso indicators. The shifts dIso at Tmin were equal 10-20 dB at different positions of the test pulse. For listeners of the second group, the summation was weak, the periods Tmin were noticeably larger, and the shifts dIso were smaller than those for listeners of the first group. Taking the pulses for phoneme consonant models, it was assumed that the auditory sensitivity and temporal masking properties of consonants phoneme loudness are responsible for their perception, for speech intelligibility. Keywords: masking, loudness, phoneme model, pulse, sequence