Re: maximal hearable speed of pulses

[Eleni Lapidaki <lapidaki@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Len:

From my review of literature about temporal perception and music, I  
would suggest that you take a look at Pöppel's research:

Pöppel (1976) opted for a period of 20 to 30 milliseconds as the  
perceptual moment or time quantum, which has been defined as the  
least timewise element of psychological experience. Pöppel reported  
evidence postulating an “integration mechanism” in our brain with a  
controversial period of about 3 seconds that is roughly equivalent to  
the time span of the conscious or psychological present.

Moreover, Pöppel (1990) proposed that this time limit of 3 seconds  
could be the basis for a central neural pacemaker or biological clock  
that causes tempi and tempo relationships in music to be  
“unbiological” and hence with unpleasant aesthetic consequences for  
listener with “traditional listening habits,” if they are not tuned  
to this clock in our brain (p. 119, translated from German by E.  
Lapidaki).

Pöppel, E. (1990). Unmusikalische Grenzüberschreitungen? [Unmusical  
crossings of limits/thresholds?]. In C. R. Pfaltz (Ed.), Musik in der  
Zeit  [Music in time] (pp. 105-124). Basel, Switzerland: Helbing &  
Lichtenhahn.

Pöppel, E. (1976). Time perception. In H. L. Teuber, R. Held, & H.  
Leibowitz (Eds.), Handbook of sensory physiology  (Vol.8, pp.  
713-729). New York: Springer-Verlag.

cheers,
eleni
********************************
Eleni Lapidaki, PhD.,
Assistant Professor of Music,
Department of Music Studies,
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki,
54124 Thessaloniki,
Greece.

phone & voicemail (office):+30-2310991807
fax:+30-2310991815
lapidaki@xxxxxxxxxxx


On 17 May 2006, at 17:09, Gerry Stefanatos wrote:

> Dear Len:
>
> Normal hearing individuals can discriminate one from two clicks  
> with as
> little as 1 to 3 ms of silence separating them (Miller & Taylor, 1948;
> Patterson & Green, 1970; Hirsh, 1975). Interestingly, some patients  
> with
> temporal lobe lesions can demonstrate problems with temporal  
> resolution
> reflected in click fusion thresholds in the order of a couple of  
> hundred
> ms (see Stefanatos, Gershkoff and Madigan (2005) for a recent review.)
> Tones require a longer ISI, in the order of 20-50 ms, as you noted.
> While this tells us something about the minimal time between auditory
> events that can be resolved by the human ear or brain,  I am not sure
> that this tells us much about resolution of a continuous train of  
> pulses
> or when fast tapping on a snaredrum become a drumroll. But I hope it's
> helpful information.
>
>
>  Gerry
>
> Gerry A. Stefanatos, D. Phil.
> Director, Cognitive Neurophysiology Laboratory
> Moss Rehab Research Institute
> Albert Einstein Medical Center
> 1200 W. Tabor Rd.
> Philadelphia, PA 19141
> Tel: (215) 456-5962
> Fax: (215) 456-5926
>
> > > > Len Vrijders <len.vrijders@xxxxxxxx> 05/17/06 8:05 AM >>>
> Hello everyone,
>
>
> I am looking for any results on experiments that give a minimal time
> between events so that the human ear can still hear two sperate
> events.
> At an interval of 50ms, people hear a tone instead of sperate beats,
> maybe that is common knowledge but I would like to read a bit
> more on the subject.
>
> People seem to be very interested in investigating the frequencies we
> can hear, and I can find many articles dealing with this
> subject, but I would like to know more about the hearable speed of
> pulses, e.g. when does fast tapping on a snaredrum become a
> drumroll...
>
> Does anyone know any articles on this matter or is maybe currently
> involved in any research around the subject?
>
>
> Thanks in advance,
> -Len