Asymmetric interactions between light and sound: Response biases vs. sensory enhancement
Single Paper Presentation

Eric Odgaard
John B. Pierce Laboratory & Yale University School of Medicine

Yoav Arieh
John B. Pierce Laboratory & Yale University School of Medicine

Lawrence Marks
John B. Pierce Laboratory & Yale University School of Medicine

     Abstract ID Number: 84
     Full text: Not available
     Last modified: May 13, 2003

Abstract
We studied the effect of irrelevant flashes of light on the loudness of simultaneously presented bursts of noise. In Experiment 1, listeners rated the noise as louder when accompanied by the light than when presented alone. Loudness enhancement persisted even when the proportion of the trials containing the light was systematically varied. In Experiment 2, we replicated the finding of loudness enhancement using a two-alternative forced choice design. The resistance of loudness enhancement to two manipulations that should eliminate response bias suggests that the effect of the light on loudness of the noise may be sensory rather than decisional. These results also suggest an interesting asymmetry in the interaction of light and sound. In a previous study, we reported that the enhancement of brightness by irrelevant noise (first reported by Stein et al., 1996) is attributable to response bias (Odgaard, Arieh, & Marks, 2003), whereas the present findings suggest that the enhancement of loudness by irrelevant light is not.