Effects of Waveform Correlation and Signal Duration on Detection of Noise Bursts in Continuous Noise
David H. Raab, Eli Osman, Edward Rich · The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America · 1963
Studies of the masking of noise bursts by continuous noise revealed the pedestal effect previously reported by others for 100-cps tones. The correlation ρ between mask and probe waveforms was found to affect detection: the pedestal effect—evidenced with ρ = 1 or with ρ = −1—was absent with ρ = 0. In a second experiment, the pedestal effect was found to diminish as probe bursts were shortened in duration from 100 to 5 msec. The results of these and related experiments provide support for the energy-detection model of Pfafflin and Mathews. Tone and noise probes are considered to be detected by virtue of the energy changes they produce. Some features of the energy-detection model are discussed.