Auditory adaptation in real and virtual rooms

Authors

  • Florian Klein Electronic Media Technology Group, Technische Universita ̈t Ilmenau, D-98693 Ilmenau, Germany
  • Stephan Werner Electronic Media Technology Group, Technische Universita ̈t Ilmenau, D-98693 Ilmenau, Germany
  • Georg Götz Electronic Media Technology Group, Technische Universita ̈t Ilmenau, D-98693 Ilmenau, Germany; Department of Signal Processing and Acoustics, Aalto University, FI-00076 Aalto, Finland
  • Karlheinz Brandenburg Electronic Media Technology Group, Technische Universita ̈t Ilmenau, D-98693 Ilmenau, Germany

Keywords:

auditory adaptation, spatial hearing, virtual acoustic environments, externalization

Abstract

Walking from room to room in real listening conditions is a natural process in our everyday life and there is no obvious challenge for our auditory system to cope with. However, in experiments with virtual acoustic environments switching the virtual room or switching from real to virtual rooms can result in auditory confusions which can lead to in-head localization. This effect is known as the room divergence effect. A series of listening tests were conducted to verify this effect under different conditions as well as experiments which studied the effect of prior sound exposure and the time variant behaviour of it. In this paper two of these experiments are described and discussed. The first experiment shows that the extent of the room divergence effect depends on the room acoustics we have just learned. That indicates, that the room divergence effect is diminished during ongoing exposure to a specific room acoustic condition. The second listening test shows further evidence of this time-variant effect and we show that it can be suppressed by interrupting with the adaptation process. These tests raise the question why switching virtual rooms leads to temporary confusions but doing so with real rooms is unproblematic. Different theories are discussed in this publication.

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Auditory Learning in Biological and Artificial Systems

Additional Files

Published

2020-05-01

How to Cite

Klein, F., Werner, S., Götz, G., & Brandenburg, K. (2020). Auditory adaptation in real and virtual rooms. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Auditory and Audiological Research, 7, 341–348. Retrieved from https://proceedings.isaar.eu/index.php/isaarproc/article/view/2019-39

Issue

Vol. 7 (2019): Auditory Learning in Biological and Artificial Systems

Section

2019/5. Other topics in auditory and audiological research

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