Subject: High-frequency hearing From: Albert Bregman <IN09(at)MUSICB.MCGILL.CA> Date: Wed, 29 Mar 1995 19:17:17 ESTDear list, I would imagine that if the sound is delivered over loudspeakers, the exact position of the loudspeakers and listeners in the room would introduce enough variation as to make the argument about sampling rate moot. Another factor is the deterioration of high-frequency sensitivity with aging. I'd be surprised if I could hear anything above 16kHz. So if you're delivering sounds over headphones to a very young human being (or a middle-aged dog), the sampling rate might have to be higher than 44.1kHz. As for our fine sensitivity to the interaural delays involved in perceiving spatial location, again the room acoustics would be primary if loudspeakers were used. Remember also that when we publish a threshold, it is the average taken over a large number of trials that we give. On any single trial there could be a lot of error. I can see how higher sampling rates might be necessary for specialized efforts, such as research in AI or psychoacoustics. I don't know exactly how the proposed standard would affect these efforts. Al --------------------------------------------------------------------- Albert S. Bregman, Professor, Dept of Psychology, McGill University 1205 Docteur Penfield Avenue, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3A 1B1. Phone: +1 514-398-6103 Fax: -4896 Email: bregman(at)hebb.psych.mcgill.ca ---------------------------------------------------------------------