Re: Implicit human echolocation

["Bruno L. Giordano" <bruno.giordano@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

thanks for all the references and comments!

I have to say that my interest in implicit echolocation stood in the 
need to avoid potential confounds in an experiment I am collaborating to:

would sighted and blindfolded participants echolocate while carrying 
another task?

The general impression I have now is: probably not, but we really do not 
know, AKA we have to be careful with the design of the apparatus.

Now, to give my humble opinion about the debate, and to state some more 
or less obvious points:

1. perception = estimation of the properties of the environment from 
sensory information.

2. Individual differences are found for any perceptual skill. In my 
opinion, a theory of perception should, ultimately, explain individual 
differences in perceptual skills in the population at large (ideally one 
should also focus on the skills used for a daily interaction with the 
environment). As such, I don't think there is something dishonest in 
investigating echolocation in both sighted and blind participants. On 
the other hand, investigating perceptual performance only in golden ears 
can be rather uninformative. Focusing on golden ears we would find that 
accurate echolocation is possible and focuses on a given type of 
auditory information, but we would still know nothing about how 
echolocation develops, about what kind of auditory information is used 
by poor echolocators, and about why not everybody is able to echolocate 
accurately.

All the best,

	Bruno


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bruno L. Giordano, Ph.D.
Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory
CIRMMT http://www.cirmmt.mcgill.ca/
Schulich School of Music, McGill University
555 Sherbrooke Street West
Montréal, QC H3A 1E3
Canada
Office: +1 514 398 4535 ext. 00900
http://www.music.mcgill.ca/~bruno/