Please read chapter 9. After reading the chapter, please respond to the following questions:
Next you will be asked what three things from the chapter that you found interesting?
1a) What did you find interesting?
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
2a) What did you find interesting?
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
3a) What did you find interesting?
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
7b) Why?
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Thanks,
--Dr. M
1a) State what your topic is.
My topic will be Akinetopsia, which is a rare neuropsychological disorder in which a person whos affected by this doesn't have any perception of motion.
1b) Discuss how the topic relates to the chapter.
this relates to this chapter in many ways, this chapter is about motion detecting and visual motion, and this relates to it because it explains how an individual life could be affected wrongly by not having any perception of motion.
1c) Discuss why you are interested in it.
this topic is very interesting to me because i didn't know such thing existed before i read this chapter, and i also didn't know how someone without perception of motion could do the little things we do well, how can they adjust if they once had that feature sometimes in their lives, how can they improve that feature, how much of a difference does it really makes, but mostly im more interested in learning more about this topic in general just because it would be useful to know.
2). when it comes to findings, i thought it was great to realized that there's such a huge thing that's called akinetopsia that people face everyday, but yet not alot of people are aware of it existence. one of the sources was very helpful because they were able to show a video of an individual who's affected by this, in one of the sites, a patient was placed in front of people who are doing different tasks, and she wasn't able to keep up with them because her perception of motion is gone, its also explained on how their motion of depth perception is in danger mostly because that's how we get to have motion if our depth perception is working, but if that's in trouble basically some part of our perception in the visual cortex wouldn't be able to work as well, these people see things as if they were already in the aftereffect of motion while the object is still in motion. how this disease is contract is a mystery, it comes in many ways, it could be from brain impairment, you could be born with lack of depth perception motion, many ways, but most of those cases come from brain impairments from accidents and such, people who have seizures can also get this motion impairments if the seizures affect the temporal center visual cortex, then it gives you higher chances of having that.
TERMS: visual cortex, Visual impairment, Central temporal cortex, Akinetopsia, visual system, motion impaired, visual perception
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B47Js1MtT4w
This video is a great presentation of how people who are affected by akinetopsia deal with life on the daily bases, how they see things and how frustrating it is to do small things.
http://mooreperceptionproject.weebly.com/patient-lm.html
The next source is pretty amazing to, it basically breaks down what causes akinetopsia, and also how it can be helped to an extent.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2213323213000236
this is also another case discussing how this disease affects people, showing images of the brain where it affects it most.
1. The first thing I found interesting was the ear decides how loud a sound is. This is done by examining the intensity and loudness of the sound. The audibility threshold is the lowest sound pressure that can be reliability heard at a given frequency. The lowest frequency humans can hear is 2000 Hz and the highest frequency is 6000. We can hear these frequencies because the of the shape of the ear canal, which helps capture sounds so the middle ear and the inner ear can use those sounds. Temporal integration is a process that plays a big role in how loud a sound is perceived to be. This is because temporal integration is why people think a sound gets louder the longer it is heard. Any sound that is heard for longer than 100-200 milliseconds will be perceived as louder the longer it is heard. I noted that, despite the fact we measure sounds using frequency; people actually hear the pitch of a sound. This is interesting because it explains a lot about why we find some sounds louder than others.
2. The second thing I found interesting was the concept of frequency selectiveness. Frequency selectiveness is the idea of matching. Matching is when one sound is harder to hear because another sound is being heard at the same time. This can be perceived as both positive and negative depending on the circumstance at the time. I perceive it to be annoying when people talk through classes, especially lectures, because that is what is happening. But it can be a good thing because white noise is an example of this when used for good. White noise is hearing all the audible frequencies at once, which sounds counterproductive, but it works because all of the sounds blend into the sound of nothing. This is interesting to me because this is why I can’t hear professors lectures if someone that is sitting close to me is talking through class, which is a big pet peeve of mine.
3. The third thing I found interesting was the role the cochlea plays in what sounds we hear. The cochlea has the job of coding the amplitude and frequency of the sound. The more amplitude a sound has the more the sterocilia bend, which is how sound is detected in the first place. This process is done by the corti measuring how much the tympanic membrane and the oval window bumps ( aka bounces) against the corti, which activates the . The oval window is the barrier between the middle ear and the inner ear, so it bounces against the tympanic membrane. The tympanic membrane is located in the outer ear and moves in and out when a new sound it heard. The number of number of times the tympanic membrane bounces called the firing rate and the firing rate is what the neurotransmitters read to send information to the brain to interpret the sound.
Coding for frequency is a harder than coding for amplitude because there are different stereocilia that curl up (aka the firing rate) for different frequencies. This is called displacement. Higher frequencies cause the oval window to bounce more, and lower frequencies displace more of the apex. This is called tuning, or place code. I thought this was interesting because both play an important role in determining what we hear.
4. The part I found least interesting was the part where we learned about all of the parts of the ear, because a lot of the terms were new to me and that made it harder to understand.
5. I think all of the stuff in my answers for 1-3 is useful to know because the combination of the concepts is basically what explains the differences between what I hear and what others hear.
6. This topic doesn’t really build on the previous information except that the visual system uses the hearing system to know when to look for something unexpected.
7. I would like to learn more about matching or if there is a biological basis for music preferences based on how each individuals ears react to different types of music because they both seem interesting to me.
8. I thought about fire alarms when I read about temporal integration, as now know that is why fire alarms on campus seem to get louder if a person chooses to not go outside during a fire drill.
9. Sound pressure, ear, sound, intensity, loudness, audibility threshold, Frequency, inner, ear , ear canal, middle ear , Temporal integration , pitch, frequency selectiveness, white, noise , cochlea, coding, amplitude, sterocilia, corti, tympanic membrane, oval window , bounces, bumps , outer ear , firing rate , neurotransmitters, stereocilia, displacement, Higher frequencies , lower frequencies, apex, tuning, place code, visual system , hearing system.
1. The first thing I found interesting was the ear decides how loud a sound is. This is done by examining the intensity and loudness of the sound. The audibility threshold is the lowest sound pressure that can be reliability heard at a given frequency. The lowest frequency humans can hear is 2000 Hz and the highest frequency is 6000. We can hear these frequencies because the of the shape of the ear canal, which helps capture sounds so the middle ear and the inner ear can use those sounds. Temporal integration is a process that plays a big role in how loud a sound is perceived to be. This is because temporal integration is why people think a sound gets louder the longer it is heard. Any sound that is heard for longer than 100-200 milliseconds will be perceived as louder the longer it is heard. I noted that, despite the fact we measure sounds using frequency; people actually hear the pitch of a sound. This is interesting because it explains a lot about why we find some sounds louder than others.
2. The second thing I found interesting was the concept of frequency selectiveness. Frequency selectiveness is the idea of matching. Matching is when one sound is harder to hear because another sound is being heard at the same time. This can be perceived as both positive and negative depending on the circumstance at the time. I perceive it to be annoying when people talk through classes, especially lectures, because that is what is happening. But it can be a good thing because white noise is an example of this when used for good. White noise is hearing all the audible frequencies at once, which sounds counterproductive, but it works because all of the sounds blend into the sound of nothing. This is interesting to me because this is why I can’t hear professors lectures if someone that is sitting close to me is talking through class, which is a big pet peeve of mine.
3. The third thing I found interesting was the role the cochlea plays in what sounds we hear. The cochlea has the job of coding the amplitude and frequency of the sound. The more amplitude a sound has the more the sterocilia bend, which is how sound is detected in the first place. This process is done by the corti measuring how much the tympanic membrane and the oval window bumps ( aka bounces) against the corti, which activates the . The oval window is the barrier between the middle ear and the inner ear, so it bounces against the tympanic membrane. The tympanic membrane is located in the outer ear and moves in and out when a new sound it heard. The number of number of times the tympanic membrane bounces called the firing rate and the firing rate is what the neurotransmitters read to send information to the brain to interpret the sound.
Coding for frequency is a harder than coding for amplitude because there are different stereocilia that curl up (aka the firing rate) for different frequencies. This is called displacement. Higher frequencies cause the oval window to bounce more, and lower frequencies displace more of the apex. This is called tuning, or place code. I thought this was interesting because both play an important role in determining what we hear.
4. The part I found least interesting was the part where we learned about all of the parts of the ear, because a lot of the terms were new to me and that made it harder to understand.
5. I think all of the stuff in my answers for 1-3 is useful to know because the combination of the concepts is basically what explains the differences between what I hear and what others hear.
6. This topic doesn’t really build on the previous information except that the visual system uses the hearing system to know when to look for something unexpected.
7. I would like to learn more about matching or if there is a biological basis for music preferences based on how each individuals ears react to different types of music because they both seem interesting to me.
8. I thought about fire alarms when I read about temporal integration, as now know that is why fire alarms on campus seem to get louder if a person chooses to not go outside during a fire drill.
9. Sound pressure, ear, sound, intensity, loudness, audibility threshold, Frequency, inner, ear , ear canal, middle ear , Temporal integration , pitch, frequency selectiveness, white, noise , cochlea, coding, amplitude, sterocilia, corti, tympanic membrane, oval window , bounces, bumps , outer ear , firing rate , neurotransmitters, stereocilia, displacement, Higher frequencies , lower frequencies, apex, tuning, place code, visual system , hearing system.
1a) What did you find interesting?
I thought the concept of amplitude and intensity to be interesting. Amplitude is the magnitude of displacement. It is the increase or decrease of a sound pressure wave. Amplitude is perceived as loudness. The sound waves that we hear are simply fluctuations in air pressure across time. The magnitude of the pressure change in a sound wave, the difference between the highest pressure area and lowest pressure are is magnitude. Pressure fluctuations may be very close together or spread apart over longer periods. For light waves, we usually describe the pattern of fluctuations by measuring the distance between peaks in the waves, the wavelength. Sound waves also have wavelengths, we more typically describe their patterns by noting how quickly the pressure fluctuates; this rate of fluctuation is known as the frequency of the wave. I thought this was interesting because I’m not really an expert when it comes to wavelengths or sound. So learning the basics was a necessity for me to build off of. Learning that sounds is measured with frequency and hertz was just interesting to me.
2a) What did you find interesting?
I also thought sine waves and complex sounds were interesting. Sine waves or pure tones are a waveform for which variation as a function of time is a sine function. These are the simplest kinds of sounds. All sounds, even complex, are a combination of sine waves. Complex sounds are best described in a spectrum that displays how much energy, amplitude, is present at multiple frequencies. Sounds with harmonic spectra are typically caused by a simple vibrating source. Each frequency component in such a sound is called harmonic. The first harmonic, fundamental frequency, is the lowest-frequency component of the sound. All the other harmonics have frequencies that are integer multiples of the fundamental. The shape of the spectrum is one of the most important qualities that distinguish different sounds. I thought this was interesting because it explained what exactly sine waves are, which I never actually knew. I’ve heard of them, but never went into such extensive detail.
3a) What did you find interesting?
I also found the outer ear section to be interesting. The sounds are first collected from the environment by the pinna, the curly structure on the side of the head we typically call an ear. Only mammals have pinnae. The particular shapes of the pinnae play an important role in our ability to localize sound sources. Sound waves are funneled by the pinna into and through the ear canal, which extends about 25 mm into the head. The main purpose of the canal is to protect the structure at its end, the tympanic membrane from damage. The tympanic membrane is a thin sheet of skin that moves in and out in response to the pressure change of sound waves. I thought this was interesting because I never knew the purposes of certain parts of our ear.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
The least thing I found interesting was the inner ear. The function of the inner ear with respect to sound waves in hearing is roughly analogous to that of the retina with respect to light waves in vision. It translates the information carried by waves into neural signals. The major structure of the inner ear is the cochlea, a tiny coiled structure embedded in the temporal bone of the skull. The cochlea is filled with watery fluids in three parallel canals. The tympanic canal, the vestibular canal, and the middle canal. The tympanic and vestibular canals are connected by a small opening, the helicoptrema. These two canals are effectively wrapped around the middle canal. The reason I didn’t find this interesting is just because I had a hard time understanding it all.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
I think just learning the basics to all of hearing will be most useful. This includes the concepts of amplitude. Amplitude is the magnitude of displacement. It is the increase or decrease of a sound pressure wave. Amplitude is perceived as loudness. The sound waves that we hear are simply fluctuations in air pressure across time. The magnitude of the pressure change in a sound wave, the difference between the highest pressure area and lowest pressure are is magnitude. Pressure fluctuations may be very close together or spread apart over longer periods. For light waves, we usually describe the pattern of fluctuations by measuring the distance between peaks in the waves, the wavelength. Sound waves also have wavelengths, we more typically describe their patterns by noting how quickly the pressure fluctuates; this rate of fluctuation is known as the frequency of the wave.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
This chapters builds on other chapters by starting a new topic of how sensation and perception works. We learned about the visual system in previous chapters but now this chapter goes into talking about the hearing.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
I would like to learn more about is white noise. White noise is noise consisting of all audible frequencies in equal amounts. White noise in hearing is analogous to white light in vision, for which all wave-lengths are present. It is a signal that includes equal energy of every frequency in the human auditory range. I want to learn more about it because I’ve been told that without white noise around us, it can make us go crazy. That there is this room somewhere that people can only last 45 minutes in because there is absolutely no noise. So this topic just generally interests me.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I thought about deafness and the different problems associated with hearing. Reading this chapter made me wonder how these problems start or how they’re caused. This chapter basically just made me want to learn more about the problems of hearing.
Terms: Amplitude, intensity, displacement, increase, decrease, sound pressure wave, loudness, fluctuations, air pressure, light waves, peaks, wavelengths, pressure, frequency, hertz, complex, sine waves, pure tones, waveform, spectrum, energy, amplitude, multiple frequencies, harmonic spectra, vibrating source, harmonic, fundamental frequency, pinna, tympanic membrane, inner ear, retina, light waves, vision, neural signals, cochlea, temporal bone, tympanic canal, vestibular canal, middle canal, sensation, perception, white noise.
1) I thought it was interesting to know that the external part of the ear is actually called the pinna and that mammals are the only ones with pinnae. I hadn’t really though of that before. I can see however, the importance of pinnae to our hearing as they funnel sound waves into the ear canal before they reach the tympanic membrane. I would imagine the different shapes have to do with what an animal needs to hear in nature or perhaps how sensitive their inner ear is to sound, but I will be interested to read more about the function of the different shapes in chapter 10.
2) I thought it was interesting to learn about the tensor tympani and the stapedius muscles in relation to the acoustic reflex. This refers to the tensing to restrict movement of the ossicles, which may prevent damage to the inner ear structures. I had always wondered how the sounds of our body did not overwhelm us and so finding out that this reflex aids us in not being completely overwhelmed by sound was really interesting. I also found it interesting that the slight delay in this reflex is also the reason sudden loud sounds can cause damage to our inner ear structures.
3) I thought it was interesting that this chapter talks about white noise or the
combination of frequencies between 20-20000 Hz. I personally listen to brown noise, which I feel is a calmer and quieter version of white noise. I have always liked the idea of sound therapy and have experimented with different “colors” of sound which I now know are different because of the frequencies they are including. My boyfriend listened to white noise when he was in the hospital because he finds it calming and therapeutic, so I guess I just find it interesting that too many sounds can be really annoying (like 20 people talking on a busy highway with phones ringing), but when you have a balance of all audible sound, it’s relaxing.
4) I have to say I found rate saturation and temporal coding pretty uninteresting to read about. While I think it is important to know how sound is taken into our brain and interpreted I found the structural information more interesting.
5) I think the section about the structures of the inner, middle, and outer ear were very important. I think knowing the anatomy and function of the components of any body function help greatly in the understand of how a process is carried out. I think two of the most important parts discussed were the organ of corti and the cochlea, as the contribute in the initial transfer of sound to the auditory nerves.
6) This chapter relates some of its concepts to those in vision, such as the combination of visual stimuli and sound stimuli. But it also discusses sine waves, which have been a constant throughout the book. I also think it will be important to find out how sound and vision sink up in our brains as we learn more.
7a) I thought it would be interesting to look up more about the different “colors” of sounds that I like to listen to and find out more about how they can be used in therapy, though that wasn’t discussed in the book. I would also like to know what frequency range each color includes.
8) I included a lot in my previous questions. Mainly I was thinking about the noises I like to listen to. I also have been involved for 2 years in the deaf community and learned a moderate amount of sign language so I already had a fair amount of knowledge about the cochlear implants and hearing aids.
Terms Used: pinna, pinnae, sound waves, ear canal, tympanic membrane, tensor tympani, stapedius muscles, acoustic reflex, ossicles, inner ear, white noise, Hz, rate saturation, temporal coding, organ of coti, cochlea, cochlear implants, rate of saturation, auditory nerves, sine waves,
First of all, I am glad we are over with vision. But this chapter about hearing is just as boring as the first couple of chapters on vision.
1. I found the fact that psychology can be so closely related to physics very interesting. The fluctuations of pressure creates sound, different frequency, intensity, and phase of fluctuation define the sound waves. Then, the frequency and intensity of sound correspond to our psychological and physical perceptions of pitch and loudness. This is interesting because when we think of psychology, we think of our internal minds, not how the physical stimuli in the world gets translated in our brains and let us perceive the world the way we think it is. Psychology to me, is no longer the internal thought process that makes people who they are, but an interaction of external physical stimuli, and the human physical and neurological anatomy.
2. I found the structure of the ear interesting. I knew the ears are pretty much shaped like a maze, and a lot of small hair sensing the sound waves and I thought that was how the neurons get fired. I was partially right, but there is a lot more to hearing than that. The process takes air pressure waves funneled by the pinna through the auditory canal to reach the tympanic membrane, which vibrates back and forth in time with the sound wave. The vibration of the tympanic membrane moves the malleus, which moves the incus, which moves the stapes, which moves the oval window, which cause pressure to bulge down the vestibular canal, which displace the middle canal up and down, which forces the tectorial membrane to share across the organ of Corti, which moves the stereo cilia hair cells back and forth, then finally the neurotransmitters get released into synapses between the hair cells and dendrites of auditory nerve fibers. That sounds like quite a journey for sound waves to be translated into neural messages for the brain to process, but it take fractions of a second for us to hear countless sound waves of different intensity in a short period of time. And that’s why it is interesting – the auditory system seems majestic to me!
3. The section on the basic operating characteristics of the auditory system is also very interesting. I did not know that there is a branch of psychology called psychophysics, and psychoacoustics is a branch of psychophysics. However, if there are courses studying music and psychology, and a whole bunch of research done on similar topics, it makes sense that sound and psychology have their own field of study. I also found that the wide range of sound frequency can be heard by humans impressive. My elementary school had me done some hearing tests, and apparently something was not right, I remembered my mom taking me to different doctors to get my ears checked out. I know for a fact that I am not deaf, but I also know that my hearing is not the best. I remember when I was in high school, kids passed around an audio of a high pitched sound that only youngsters can detect. They used that sound as a ringtone to cheat on tests. I couldn’t hear that sound, I felt very defeated but when they got caught cheating and I got lucky, I stopped feeling bad for myself.
4. This chapter is boring. The anatomy of the ears are very interesting but it took more than a few reads for me to grasp the whole concept. This chapter is hard, I would have enjoyed it more if it was easier to understand. I learned less from this chapter than most of the other chapters because it is very heavy. There are several concepts that I think I would love if the textbook had made it a little easier to understand.
5. I think the concepts of thresholds are very important in our understanding of sensation and perception. To detect thresholds, the scientists poke funny stuff on you to measure how intense the sine waves frequencies must be for a neuron to fire. This is important because it does not matter what comes in a normally functioning ears, if the neurons do not fire like they should, or if the threshold is slightly off, we cannot hear any sound. By understanding threshold and the intensity it takes to fire neurons, as well as the break between each neuron firing session, we are able to understand the differences between what we hear and what is actually out in the world.
6. This is a brand new topic on hearing. We did not discuss any hearing yet. However, this chapter mentioned the similarity between the ears and the eyes – the hair in the ears and the cones and rods do similar jobs at detecting auditory and sight, respectively.
7. I want to learn more about the different kinds of hearing aids and how they can assist different kinds of hearing loss. I have only encountered a handful of people who need hearing aids. I had one on myself when I was younger because the kid in the class next door had it, so I borrowed it from him. It was very exciting to hear all the sounds I couldn’t hear before. I wore it and went spying on teachers. But then it got really annoying after a while because of all the white noise that was coming in.
8. I thought about how sometimes I get commented on being deaf. I am not sure if I am not paying attention or if I am actually have worse hearings than most people, but my hearing does not interfere with my life except for a few occasions where I do not hear people calling my name.
TERMS: thresholds, auditory system, psychophysics, psychoacoustics, sine waves, auditory canal, organ of corti, tympanic membrane, malleus, incus, stapes, oval window, vestibular canal, stereo cilia, neurotransmitters, dendrites, synapses
1a. The first thing I found interesting from chapter nine was the concept of temporal integration which addresses our perception of loudness based on the duration of the sound entering our ears. Researchers have found that we perceive longer sounds to be louder than shorter sounds and this phenomena can also be applied our visual system when it is introduced to a very long light. Specifically, temporal integration depends on the summation of energy over a brief period of time and is the process by which sound at a constant level is perceived to be louder when it has greater duration. Temporal integration occurs over an interval of one hundred to two hundred milliseconds such that if sound is presented at one hundred milliseconds we will perceive it as softer than the same light presented at three hundred milliseconds.
b. I found this interesting because I have experienced this phenomena many times in my life. After hearing a specific noise for a long period of time I perceive it as louder and usually more of an annoyance. One specific example is the constant noise emitted from construction crews in my neighborhood. After hearing the noise they make for an extended period of time I feel like it is louder than it was to begin with even though it is probably not any louder. Additionally I found it interesting that this can be attributed to vision as well as hearing.
2a. The second concept that I found interesting from chapter nine is white noise that consists of all the audible frequencies in the human auditory range in equal amounts. Researchers utilize white noise to measure frequency selectivity by masking or presenting an individual with multiple noises at once to make the detection of one single tone difficult.
b. I found this interesting because we are surrounded by white noise almost constantly in the world we live in. It is amazing that so many sounds are filling our ears but only the most important sounds are perceived by the auditory system and the brain. I also found this interesting because many people prefer to work and sleep in areas with white noise at all times which suggests that we have habituated to background noise and function at our best when it is present. I would be very interested to look up research regarding white noise and human adaptation.
3a. The last concept from chapter nine that I found interesting regards hearing loss and specifically the presence of otitis media. It is a temporary experience of hearing loss that commonly occurs in children who have inflammation in the middle ear from an infection. Otitis media results from mucus buildup in the middle ear during an infection and causes the hearing threshold to be raised such that a sound would need to be fifty decibels louder than usual for a child to hear it. This condition is thankfully temporary meaning that children once again experience normal hearing after the mucus has been absorbed back into surrounding tissues.
b. I found this interesting because I experienced it many times as a kid. Each time I had an ear infection my ears felt "full" of mucus and as a result the sounds that I could normally hear without a program were muffled and hard to perceive. Sounds had to be presented much louder than before for me to hear them adequately. I also like to read about medical implications such as this because it is something that can be applied to everyone and it makes the topic easier to understand.
4a. I did not find anything in chapter nine to be completely uninteresting but I did find the basic structure of the auditory system to be overwhelmingly full of information that is hard to remember without repeated exposure.
b. I did not find the information to be uninteresting but it is extremely difficult to remember all the parts of the auditory system without repeated exposure and detailed information from an outside source because it can be hard to retain all of the information given in a textbook.
5. I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the auditory brain structures because they are an important part of understanding sensation and perception. It demonstrated the parts of the brain imperative for the sensation of hearing as well as our perception of noise. This will be helpful for the rest of the class because it furthers my knowledge of areas of the brain responsible for perception as well as builds on other concepts that have already been covered in the class.
6. This chapter relates to previous chapters distantly. It begins to cover a new sensation and builds on the general principles of sensation and perception that we have covered in other sections. Chapter nine also builds on our knowledge of brain structures associated with perception as well as various deficits that mirror the format of the previous chapters.
7ab. I would like to learn more about hearing deficits that can be found in humans. I think it is interesting to look at the auditory system through disabilities because it aids in our understanding and paints a clear picture of the specific functions of the brain when it is perceiving sound.
8. I thought about the presence of white noise in our daily lives as well as the prevalence of auditory disabilities in our society. I am interested in looking at research as to why these two phenomena occur and how we function with the presence of them.
Terms: temporal integration, sensation, perception, white noise, frequency, masking, otitis media, auditory brain structures, human auditory range
1a) The first thing that I found interesting was the basic qualities of sound waves. Looking into the basics of frequency and amplitude. Amplitude is the magnitude of displacement of a sound pressure wave which is perceived as loudness. Patterns of sound is most typically described as frequency of sound waves and measured in hertz. Amplitude which is correlated with loudness a psychological aspect of sound that is related back to the perceived intensity. With in frequencies there is also pitch low-frequencies correspond to low pitches and does the same with high-frequencies and high pitches but this is all just a psychological aspect of sound and how it relates to perceived frequency. Sound is measured not only in hertz which measures the unit of frequency but there is also decibel which measures for the physical intensity of a sound.
1b) I found all of this interesting to me because when we were learning about the science of sound in high school we heard about sound waves and about frequencies but they really never made sense like they did to me in the reading. I am not for sure if it was all just the reading but the fact that I have taken other classes that have related right back to the way we hear sounds and what our brain has to do to perceive these sounds and make them understandable to the mind/brain.
2a) The second item that I found interesting from the chapter was the section that looked at was the basic structure of the mammalian auditory system. Within the ear there are many parts, there are three main sections of the ear, the outer ear, middle ear, and the inner ear. Within the outer ear there are three main parts of the ear the first part is the pinna which is the funnel like part of the ear that collects sounds from the environment. The sound waves are funneled by the pinna into the ear canal which conducts the sound vibrations from the pinna to the tympanic membrane and helps to prevent damages to the tympanic membrane. The tympanic membrane also known as the eardrum vibrates in the response to sound. The middle ear consists of three tiny bones the ossicles that amplify sound waves. The malleus which receives the vibrations from the tympanic membrane, and the other side of the ossicles is the incus which connects the mallus and the stapes. The stapes transmits the vibrations of sound waves to the oval window which is also another border of the middle ear and the inner ear. The inner ear is here to find changes in sound pressure available in the environment are translated into neural signals that inform listeners about the world.
2b) I found this section very interesting cause when I think of the ear I didn't realize that there were so many parts that make up those in which we hear sounds from the different vibrations in the world. I find it interesting that our ears are just a small part of our body but that they are actually made up of so many little parts that in reality control us being able to hear those items around us in our daily life.
3a) The third thing that i found interesting was the section on hearing loss. There are roughly 30 million people in america that suffer from some form of a hearing loss. There are many reasons why someone may lose their hearing. There is conductive hearing loss which occurs when the middle ear bones lose their ability to freely convey vibrations from the tympanic membrane to the oval window. otosclerosis is when there is an abnormal growth of the middle-ear bones that cause hearing loss. There is also sensorineural hearing loss which most commonly occurs inside the cochlea and is due to defects in the cochlea or auditory nerve.
3b) I found this particularly interesting because of the field of study that I would like to pursue it gives me more knowledge as to how those main parts in our ear can be damaged and cause a hearing loss. Not only can they cause a hearing loss but they can actually also cause an individual to go completely deaf.
4a) One topic that I found least interesting was the section about the section about the auditory nerve. Looking further into the characteristic frequency and as it went further into detail of how our brain understands the different frequencies and sound waves, white noise.
4b) I found this section less interesting to me because it was not something that I could understand. I found myself often rereading a section more than once and it was very hard for me to comprehend the concepts behind how our brain processes all the noises around us.
5) This chapter has a lot of information that I feel that will be used within sensation and perception. Hearing is one of our main senses that we often rely on in our daily lives and without that sense we would have to find other ways and adjust to that of which we live our life. We are taught at such a young age some things that we are to rely on for sound for safety like the fire alarm. Sitting in a room with no hearing and the fire alarm goes of those people have to rely on others in the room to tell them or hope that their is a light that flashes or there is a major vibration that they are able to feel but they are not able to just rely on “hearing” the fire alarm.
6) This chapter does not particularly build on from the previous chapters but in a sense it does as it introduces a new topic within the senses that we live our live using and vision and hearing as one of the main senses most people rely on in life.
7) The topic that I am most interested in looking further into is looking into what different items can cause one to lose their hearing whether it be otosclerosis or sensorineural hearing loss.
8) During this chapter I thought a lot about those who do have a hearing loss or are born deaf and are never able to hear the world. I thought about how it would be interesting to me to see the inside of the ear and compare the view of the main parts that we use on a daily basis and are the main effects of our hearing system.
9) Terms: Frequencies, Frequency, Magnitude, sound waves, Amplitude, Intensity, Hertz, Decibels, low-frequencies, High-frequencies, loudness, pitch, auditory system, outer ear, middle ear, inner ear, pinna, ear canal, tympanic membrane, eardrum, ossicles, malleus, incus, oval window, stapes, hearing loss, conductive hearing loss, otosclerosis, sensorineural hearing loss, auditory nerve, characteristic frequency, white noise,
1a) The first interesting section that popped out to me in chapter 9 was the talk about human hearing and how we only have a limited range of frequencies present in environmental sounds. Frequency meaning the number of times per second that a pattern of a pressure change repeats. It is also perceived as pitch.
1b) This was interesting to me because we have learned that people lessen their hearing standards by some of the choices we make as children, for example if a child listens to abnormally loud music all the time, then they may have a lower frequency of hearing later in life. We also know that if you have taken good care of your hearing then you may be able to detect sound that vary from 20 to 20,000 hertz (measurement of sound wave frequencies which is amazing!
2a) The next part I found interesting was on the outer ear portion including the pinna (funnel-like part of the ear), the ear canal, and the tympanic membrane which is also referred to as the ear drum.
2b) This was interesting to me for two main reasons. The first was I had never heard the actual scientific term for the outer ear called pinna, so when I read that it through me off for amount and grab my attention. The second part was learning that if you puncture your eardrum you won’t go deaf and that it can grow back much like skin. This was surprising to me since I had never heard that before.
3a) A third part that I found interesting was on acoustic reflex which is a reflex that protects the ear from intense sounds through contraction of the stapedius (muscle attached to the stapes) and tensor tympani (muscle attached to the malleus).
3b) This was interesting to read about because it does not help very much in situation with short term loudness like a gun fire or a dish breaking. Rather this reflex helps protect our ears from prolonged noises like a loud alarm going off. It was also interesting to know that this reflex occurs sometimes when swallowing, talking and just general body movement to help keep the auditory system from being overwhelmed by sound created by our own bodies.
4a) The part that I least enjoyed from this chapter was on stereocilium which is any of the hair like extensions on the tips of hair cells in the cochlea that, when flexed, create the release of neurotransmitters.
4b) As I have stated in past assignments I am not very interesting in the subject of neurotransmitters mostly because I find it boring, not difficult.
5) The most useful part of this chapter was understanding all the tiny parts starting from the out ear then moving to the inner ear and how they work together. This helps people understand how they are able to hear, and also give doctors and specialist the map out they need in order to find out what might be wrong when a person cannot hear.
6) This chapter builds on from the previous ones by going into detail on the sensation and perception of hearing. Even in the first chapter of this book we covered a part on thresholds and how this ranges on all of our senses. Then it is once again brought up in this chapter by going into how this measured in sound by frequencies.
7a) I would like to learn more about otosclerosis an abnormal growth of the middle-ear bones that causes hearing lose.
7b) They did not go into too much detail on this part, and I am confused if this only happens for children like otitis media, or if someone my age or older could get this.
8) One thing that I thought about while reading this chapter was that I had a fan going. When I read about white noise and how this can drown out other sounds it made me realize why I always work with my fan on. It’s not because it’s hot in my room, I just enjoy the sound it makes and helps me to concentrate better.
9) otosclerosis, otitis media, white noise, sensation, perception, stereocilium, neurotransmitters, frequencies, hertz, acoustic reflex, hearing lose, pinna, ear canal, cochlea, tympanic membrane
I found the section about the coding of amplitude in the cochlea interesting. This is what occurs as the amplitude (or loudness) of a sound wave increases and the tympanic membrane and oval window move farther in and out with the pressure fluctuations. What then occurs is the bulge in the vestibular canal becomes bigger which caused the cochlear partition to move farther up and down. This then causes the tectorial membrane to shear across the organ of corti (the structure on the basilar membrane of the cochlea that is composed of hair cells and dendrites of auditory nerve fibers) which causes the hair cells to bend back and forth and thus more neurotransmitters to be released. The reason I found this so interesting is because it such a huge amount of things that happen simply to hear the loudness of sound. Something that happens so very quickly and we rarely give it a second thought.
I also found the section that talked about frequency and pitch interesting. The text states that we will perceive greater rises in pitch for lower frequencies than we do for higher frequencies. The reason is that the temporal code for frequencies starts to break down above 1000Hz this makes performance suffer because the auditory system is relying solely on place coding. Although I found this really interesting I didn’t completely understand it and this is probably something I will look further into for the post on Wednesday. Sometimes a real life example makes things clearer than a written explanation.
I found the section about hearing loss interesting because I have an interest in ASL and have become familiar with the Deaf Community. It is interesting to learn that there are several ways that one can experience hearing loss. Conductive hearing loss occurs more in the middle ear and is caused mainly by ear infections and is easily rectified when infections are eradicated. Sensorineural hearing loss occurs inside the cochlea and can be a result of damage to the auditory nerve. This occurs when the hair cells are injured. Sometimes this can be caused by certain medications but most of the time it is the result of too much loud noise exposure. The book briefly discussed cochlear implants that can improve hearing. The text states that young children generally do best with the implants. But it is important to remember that it does not replicate sound like that of a hearing person. They are also a very controversial subject in the Deaf community.
The beginning of the chapter especially the section that discussed sine waves and complex sounds was the least interesting to me. This is about the basic mechanics of sound and how it travels. I think it is packed with so much detailed and rather complicated information it is difficult to read and comprehend even after going over it several times.
I think the part about how we decipher tones and pitch was pretty useful. This explains how we react to things and why certain noises are considered pleasant and others annoying.
I would like to look more into either cochlear implants, from multiple perspectives . I would also like to learn more about frequency and pitch. Both are very interesting subjects in sensation and perception.
I thought about how hearing affects our feelings toward something. In ASL when interpreting music it is less about the sound than the movement and choice of signs. Also while hearing people may not enjoy the loud pounding of bass this is very important to Deaf individuals ability to enjoy music, as they must feel it rather than hear it.
Terms: tympanic membrane, cochlea, sound wave, amplitude, vestibular canal, tectorial membrane, organ of corti, dendrites, frequencies, pitch, hearing loss, conductive hearing loss, sensorineural hearing loss, cochlear implants
The first thing i found interesting is the parts of the ear. I think its interesting how how so many small parts can work together so well to do some amazing things. The way our ears work are even more crazy than the way our eyes work Its so many small small parts working together. Its crazy that we can hear because of little hairs
Second is afferent efferent fibers. I think its interesting that our bodies have these different neurons and that know exactly where to take what kind of information. You generally don't sit there thinking the afferent fibers took m information to the CNS and the efferent take it from there to the periphery. You're just like oh cool i hear things. Breaking it down knowing exactly why is cool.
Two tone suppression is also interesting. It explains why when two noises are presented at once, we can hear one better than the other. Like the fact I have the tv on and the water is running in the kitchen, I can hear the tv better but the water is still a faint sound in the background, loud enough to where I know its there, but quiet enough where I can still hear the TV over it.
The amplitude, frequency , loudness, pitch, that kind of stuff was less interesting to me because its all things i've learned more about in the past. The other stuff in the chapter was relatively new to me . So the least interesting part was the stuff i've learned before. The basic stuff is stuff i feel like just skipping over.
I think the most important part of the chapter is all the parts of the ear. Learning different parts of the body is something i've always had trouble with so the more i go over them the better.
I would like to learn more about the two tone suppression. I'm interested in why it happens where we can listen to multiple things, how can we focus on two things but more on one than the other. i think its so cool that our body is evolved enough to do so.
I thought just a lot more in depth about my every day life. I think every day ill be thinking back to this main chapter on hearing as I'm listening to different things throughout the day.
parts of ear, two tone suppression, afferent, efferent, CNS, fibers, periphery, amplitude, frequency, pitch, loudness,
1) I think this chapter is easier to understand because the hearing process is less complex than the visual (so far). Being easier to understand, I find it more interesting. Basic concepts of sound that I found interesting were spectrum and timbre. Because pure tones (sine waves) are rarely found in daily life, most sounds are described using a spectrum. This displays how much energy, amplitude and frequency of complex sound. Timbre describes sound quality based on the relative energy of each component.
2) I found reading about the similarities and differences between the visual and hearing processes to be very interesting. Hearing is much faster and sensitive because it does not wait on biochemical processes and utilizes mechanoelectrical transduction (MET). In MET, stereocilia (the bristles on the hair cells of the inner ear) of each hair cell are connected by tip links. When a stereocilium is deflected by the shearing of the tectorial membrane, other stereocilia connected by tip links are effected. The tip link pulls open an ion pore. Through this opening, K+ ions rapidly rush into the hair cell causing a depolarization effect. This depolarization causes neurotransmitters to be released to the auditory nerve’s dendrites. In this manner, sound energy is transformed into a neural impulse. This process is much faster than the visual process because it partially mechanical. Additionally, there are millions of photoreceptors, but only 15000 stereocilia. Because each stereocilium is an extremely efficient specialized neuron (compared to a photoreceptor), there are fewer, giving the brain more streamlined information to process.
3) The cochlea is made up or three parallels canals that are coiled within the inner ear. This is where the organ of Corti lies. Amplitude is encoded by the fluctuation of the tympanic membrane, which will cause the vestibular canal to bulge more, the cochlear partition to move farther up and down, and the tectorial membrane to deflect hair cells to a higher degree, releasing more neurotransmitters, and therefore stimulating the auditory nerve. Louder sounds result in more action potentials fired by the auditory nerve fibers. The cochlea encodes for frequency based on which area of the cochlear partition is displaced, and to what degree. Closer to the apex, the partition is tuned to lower frequencies, while the area close to the oval window is tuned to higher frequencies. Learning about the cochlea’s encoding process was interesting because it is complex, yet much less intricate than the process for sight.
4) It seems like every chapter there is a portion at the end that is devoted to some sort of disorder or abnormality related to the content in the chapter. Learning about these disorders is not interesting to me because they are all very similar and not very useful for our psychological purposes. They rarely reveal information about normal psychology. Although giving them some consideration in the context of an abnormal psychology class might be interesting, in my opinion they aren’t very relevant for sensation and perception.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
In chapter 11, we will utilize some of the basic concepts of sound such as harmonics and timbre. Harmonic spectrum refers to the complex sound where energy is made up of energy multiples of the fundamental frequency. Timbre refers to the quality of sound produced by the harmonic components’ relative energy.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
Learning about spectrums with regard to sound reminded me of Fourier analysis from an early chapter. Fourier analysis is the mathematic logarithm which breaks a complex sensory mode into its component pieces.
7) I would like to learn more about psychophysics of sound, and the relationship between sound and thought. So far the book has not focused much on higher level perception of vision or hearing so hopefully that comes later.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
In some ways, our eyes and ears work in a similar fashion to transform sensory input to neural impulses. These parts of the chapter reminded me of earlier ones about the corresponding concepts related to vision.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Harmonic spectrum, timbre, Fourier analysis, stereocilia, specialized neuron, mechanoelectric transduction (MET), cochlea, organi of Corti, outer ear, frequency, tip link, auditory nerve, tympanic membrane, vestibular canal, cochlear partition, tectorial membrane, neurotransmitters, hair cells, oval window,
1a) Timbre
1b) I found this interesting because I was in chorus and band all throughout middle school and high school. Having an understanding of pitch is crucial to knowing what to with your voice or your instrument. In chorus, it was mandatory for us to know how to find Middle C using our memories and hitting with perfection. I have always found this helpful as a person who predominantly sings the harmony.
2a) Audibility Threshold
2b) I found this interesting because of our discussions of
thresholds earlier in the semester. I find the minimum and maximum of sensitivity to sound intriguing. Knowing this information can help us learn what hearing loss is like and how it can be corrected.
3a) Hearing loss
3b) After my mom became immersed into the Deaf community after taking some ASL classes at UNI, I became increasingly interested in this group of people. I love learning their language and customs, and also enjoy understanding how I can best serve them at my place of work as a waitress.
4a) Parts of the ear
4b) This part was the least interesting to me. I don’t enjoy learning about the parts of a particular organism. I also did not enjoy learning about the parts of the eye. I am more interested in the outcomes that these parts affect.
5) I think the most useful part of this chapter, even though I did not enjoy it that much, would be the parts of the ear. Knowing how these parts interact with each other and how they function is really important to understanding everything else that comes from hearing.
6) I think this chapter is now moving from perception by sight and moving into perception by sound. It is building off other chapters by using our previous knowledge of sensation and perception and applying it to the ear instead of the eye.
7a) Different types of hearing loss
7b) I would like to study the different types of hearing loss and how they affect different people.
8) During spring break, I was diagnosed with Mononucleosis, or just Mono as it’s more commonly known. Since then, my throat has swollen and has made it impossible for me to speak. So in order to communicate, I will use ASL, mostly finger spelling, to communicate with my mom. This chapter definitely got me thinking about what it would really be like to need to use that language.
9) Key terms: Timbre, audibility threshold, hearing loss, Deaf, ear, eye, sight, perception, sensation
1a) The first thing that I found interesting was the basic structure of the parts of the ear.
1b) The basic structure of the ear starts with the pinna, or the ear. This is the funnel like object on the side of the head that acts as the initial sound wave collector. The sound waves travel past this funnel into the ear canal until it reaches a membrane called the tympanic membrane. Also known as the eardrum, the tympanic membrane is also protected by the canal. When the sound wave hits the membrane, it is further amplified by three tiny bones in the middle ear, which are called the ossicle bones. Specifically, these bones are the malleus, the incus, and the stapes. The sound wave then goes to the inner ear to the cochlea and the auditory nerve, which transfers the information gathered to the brain. I find this interesting because I enjoy body parts like this. I am fascinated that the body is able to create organs that serve functions as seemingly complex as making sense out of sound.
2a) The next topic that I found interesting was the organ of Corti.
2b) I found this interesting because the hair cells on this organ working with the movements of tectorial membrane are what ignites neural firings for sound sensation. I believe that it is really neat that a membrane shearing across tiny hairs with stereocilia in the inner ear causes neurotransmitters to release, and sound to be sensed and perceived by the brain.
3a) The third thing that I found interesting is otoscleriosis.
3b/7) I found this interesting because I think bones are really neat. Some of the most fascinating disorders I find are to do with bones. I also think its really interesting that a single chink in the chain that the sound wave travels can wreak so much havoc. This also leads me to want to know more about this disorder. The text did not offer a good amount of detail on the subject and I would really like to know the specifics of how it happens, what exactly happens, and how treatments for this disorder are carried out.
4a) The one thing that I found least interesting was the piece about sine waves.
4b) This wasn’t interesting to me because the subject matter kind of went over my head. Math is not my strong suit and I believe my brain shuts down when related subjects are gone over. I need an actual person explaining mathematical like concepts to me, and reading text does not do much to aid in my understanding of the material.
5) I believe that the piece of information most useful in understanding this type of sensation is the definition of what sound actually is. Sound is created when something vibrates. While the actual particles of an object may not be displaced a great deal, when something vibrates, a type of domino effect is created. It is much like if while standing in a long line, I gave the person in front of me a great shove. That person will most likely bump into another person who will in turn bump into yet another person. This pattern will continue in a positive correlation with the intensity that the initial shove was. This base knowledge of sound gives visual to how sound works. For myself, seeing a visual for how something works helps me to better understand something.
6) This chapter moves attention to a new method of sensation. That is, we change which sense we are studying. In previous chapters, we learned a great deal about how we sense the world in a visual manner. However, people do not sense and perceive the world around us purely through vision alone. This chapter delves deeper into the auditory sensations that people experience, rather than visual.
8) I thought a lot about the structural workings of the ear and the nervous system. It all reminded me of a Rube Goldberg machine. With a sound wave causing the movement and vibration of one part of the ear, which vibrates into another part, and so on. This goes on until the tectorial membrane hits the stereocilia of the hair cell on the organ of Corti, and the information is sent into the nervous system. In the nervous system, a similar occurrence happens with dendrites, axons, neurotransmitters, and action potentials. It just seems to me like it all an elaborate machine designed for a small purpose. Only in this case, it only leads to more Rube Goldberg like machines.
Terms: Ear; sound; sound wave; pinna; ear canal; tympanic membrane; eardrum; ossicle; bones; malleus; incus; stapes; cochlea; auditory nerve; organ of Corti; hair cell; stereocilia; tectorial membrane; neurotransmitter; otoscleriosis; nervous system; dendrites; axons; action potentials; perception; sensation
The first thing I found interesting was sensorineural hearing loss. This is hearing loss caused by defects in the cochlea or auditory nerve. This is often due to damage caused to the hair cells. This can be caused by things such as ototoxic drugs which produce adverse effects on cochlear or vestibular organs or nerves or by excessive loud noises. This topic interests me, because I am almost completely deaf in my left ear because of a damaged auditory nerve.
The second concept I found interesting was temporal integration. This is the process by which a sound at a constant level is perceived as being louder when it is of greater duration. The term also applies to perceived brightness, which depends on the duration of light. For hearing, temporal integration occurs over an interval of 100-200 milliseconds. Because of this, if a sound is presented for less than 100 milliseconds, it will be perceived as softer than the same amplitude sound and frequency presented for 300 milliseconds. Interestingly though, the phenomenon seems to cap out at 300 milliseconds, as any differences beyond that (such as 300 to 1000 milliseconds) are perceived with little difference. I find it very interesting that the brain does this. It makes me wonder if there is some evolutionary advantage to this phenomenon.
The third thing I found interesting was the entire anatomical structure of the ear. This was so interesting to me, because of its complexity. It is crazy to me that such a simple looking organ as an ear is actually so incredibly complex. Even beyond that, it boggles my mind how sensitive the ear is, and that such sensitive organs are not really hurt that badly by physical attacks like getting hit with something. I would say that it hurts more to have someone scream in your ear than it to get punched in the ear.
The one thing I found uninteresting in this chapter was the discussion behind the physics of sound waves. It was initially interesting to me when I took my high school physics class, but it has since become much less interesting for some reason. At least it is only reaffirming my position to never go into psycho-physics.
I think the most helpful thing in understanding sensation and perception is the different phenomena such as temporal integration and masking.
This chapter is very similar to the previous chapters, as it applies the same sort of information we have been discussing about vision to hearing.
I would really like to do more research on hearing loss, especially sensorineural hearing loss. I lost the hearing in my left ear at a young age, and it was never really determined how it happened. I think it would be interesting to see if any new research or data has emerged that may hold the answer as to why this happened to me.
Rather predictably, I spent the entire duration of the reading thinking about my lack of hearing ability.
Terms: Sensorineural Hearing Loss, Ototoxic, Vestibular Organs, Temporal Integration, Amplitude, Frequency, Psycho-Physics
I found sound waves, the physiology and psychoacoustics of hearing to be the most interesting chapter yet. Sound waves that humans hear are fluctuations in air pressure across time; I thought it was more of an echo, so this took me by surprise. The increase or decrease in a sound wave is called the amplitude. Amplitude is associated with the perceptual quality of loudness. Loudness is the psychological aspect of sound related to perceived intensity or magnitude; while frequency is associated with pitch. Low-frequency sounds correspond to low pitches, and high-frequency sounds correspond to high pitches. Intensity is the amount of sound energy falling on a unit area. All of these fall back on each other, so it was great to be able to make sense of it and see how it relates. Sound waves are described by how quickly the pressure fluctuates. Frequency is the number of times per second that a pattern of pressure change repeats, and it is measured in hertz (Hz), where 1 Hz equals one cycle per second. I never bothered to learn, or look up the term hertz, I just associated it with music and left it at that, this makes an enormous amount of sense.
Sine waves, complex tones, and fourier analyses, were new terms to me so I decided to pay a little closer attention to them. Sine waves are simple sounds. The air pressure in a sine wave changes sinusoidally, continuously, at the same frequency. A sine wave can be described as smooth repetitive oscillation, kind of like the graphs most of drew in math. Sine waves are uncommon because few vibrations in our environment can be considered simple sounds. Hearing tests and tuning forks are examples of sine waves. According to the textbook, flutes can produce musical notes that are close to pure tones but almost every other sound source in the world produces complex tones. A complex tone is a sound wave consisting of more than one continuous sound at different frequencies. Despite, pure tones being so rare, it’s important to learn about them because complex tones are varying combinations of sine waves, at different frequencies with different amplitudes. The individual components of a complex sound wave can be described by a process called Fourier analysis, which didn’t make sense until I saw the pictures in the book. A Fourier analysis is a mathematical theorem by which any sound can be divided into a set of sine waves, and combining these sine waves will reproduce the original sound. I have actually had experience taking apart sine waves and putting them back together, didn’t realize there was a name for it. I think the concepts of sine waves, complex tones, and fourier analysis were interesting to learn about, and important, because I didn’t realize there were differences in the commonality of pure and complex tones, and that complex tones are varying combinations of sine waves at different frequencies with different amplitudes.
The physiology of the middle ear interesting to learn about mainly because we’ve learned about it before at some point in middle or high school, and I’ve found anytime I look at old material at a later time I find something new, or understand it better than before. The outer ear is made up of the pinna, which is the outer, funnel-like portion of the ear, and the ear canal, which conducts sound vibrations from the pinna to the tympanic membrane and prevents damage to the tympanic membrane, or the eardrum. I always thought it that puncturing your eardrum will not lead to deafness in that ear, but it turns out that the tympanic membrane will heal itself, but it’s possible to damage it beyond repair. This tympanic membrane is the border between the outer and middle ear, which consists of three small bones, the ossicles, which amplify sound waves. The malleus, the first ossicle, receives vibration from the tympanic membrane and is attached to the eardrum on one side and to the second ossicle the incus on the other. The incus is connected to the stapes, which transmits the vibrations of sound waves to the oval window of the cochlea, another membrane which represents the border between the middle and inner ear. These ossicles, the smallest bones in the body, amplify vibrations in two ways. The joints between the bones are hinged in a way that makes them work like levers, and this lever action increases the amount of pressure change by about 33%. The second way these tiny bones increase the energy transmitted to the inner ear is by concentrating energy from a larger to a smaller surface area. The tympanic membrane is approximately 18 times larger than the oval window, so the pressure on the oval increases 18 fold depending on the pressure on the tympanic membrane. The textbook helpfully related this idea to the principle of how snowshoes are effective for keeping your feet from sinking through the snow and stiletto heels are hazardous to wood floors. It said to relate the heel of the foot to the tympanic membrane and the oval window to the tip of the stiletto heel, which was a very effective example in helping me to better understand this concept. It is an interesting way of describing it, and it turns out I was right, I did pick up a few new things.
The auditory nerve was probably the least interesting thing to me. Sounds with different frequencies displace different regions of the cochlear partition, and that inner hair cells, extend along a line traveling the length of the cochlear partition. The responses of individual auditory nerve fibers to different frequencies should be related to their place along the cochlear partition. The different fibers selectively respond to different sound frequencies, and selectivity is clearest when sounds are very faint. Like I said before this was more of a review of what I learned about a long time ago, I wouldn’t say its uninteresting, but I did find myself just glazing over the section.
I think the physiology of the ear is the most useful to helping understand sensation and perception, how the structure of the ear functions is important as well. If you can get that down then you realize how complex and sensitive the whole idea of just hearing is, and with that information I think you could make out some of the other things, like how sound travels. I would relate it back to how the ossicles amplify and decrease vibrations, due to their function of allowing humans to hear quiet and loud sounds, without damaging the delicate structures of the inner ear. On an interesting note I found out why I hear myself chew, and that it’s a lot louder than it sounds, that’s thanks to the muscles of the middle ear, they tense during swallowing, talking and general body movement, helping to keep the auditory system from being overwhelmed by sounds made by our own bodies.
I liked the chapter overall, I wouldn’t mind reading up on how to improve hearing, either through my own doing or assistance, like hearing aids work, and how they work. I might do my topic on the subject.
Terms: psychoacoustics, hearing, sound waves, air pressure, magnitude, pressure change, amplitude, intensity, sound energy, light waves, frequency, hertz, auditory characteristics, loudness, pitch, low-frequency, high-frequency, sine waves, complex, tones, fourier analysis, pure tones, sinusoidally, waveform, sine function, period, phase, complex tones, spectrum, middle ear, pinna, ear canal, tympanic membrane, eardrum, ossicle, amplification, inner ear, outer ear, stapedius, auditory system, auditory nerve, cochlear partition, inner hair cells
1a & b) What did you find interesting? Why? The first item in this chapter I thought was interesting was reading about the differences between amplitude, frequency, loudness, and pitch. Amplitude is the magnitude of displacement of a sound pressure wave. Frequency is the number of times per second that a pattern of pressure change repeats. I did not know that frequency and pitch were the same, when it comes to sound. Loudness is the psychological aspect of sound related to perceived intensity. Pitch is defined as the psychological aspect of sound related mainly to perceived frequency. I know all I did was give you the definitions of these terms, but what I found interesting was seeing the diagrams that related to these terms. I thought it was interesting to read about how the environment plays a part when it comes to how speed travels. Sound waves travel at a particular speed depending on the medium. I had no idea that sound travels faster when it is more humid outside. I would have thought the more humid or muggy it is outside, would inhibit the sound. After reading this section of the chapter, it does make sense that sound would travel faster, because it has more atmospheric molecules to bounce off. The part of the chapter that discusses what frequencies animals could here at was also interesting to read about. For example, bats. Bats use sound frequencies above 60,000 Hz.
2a & b) What did you find interesting? Why? The second item in this chapter I found interesting was the basic structure of the mammalian auditory system. I found this part of the chapter interesting because it took me back to last spring & summer taking Human Anatomy I & II. Seeing the structures of the outer, middle, and inner ear got me a little more focused on reading about their specific functions. I wasn’t so much interested in the pinna (the part of the ear we see outside our head), and not the ear canal, but more of the middle ear and inwards. I knew the middle ear had three tiny bones called ossicles, and that those ossicles have a malleus, incus, and stapes. It was interesting to read about how the bones work. I never thought of those bones operating like a lever system. The way these bones are aligned, allows for maximum use of energy being pushed in the inner ear.
3a & b) What did you find interesting? Why? The third
item I found interesting in this chapter was the section on psychoacoustics. Psychoacoustics is the study of the psychological correlates of the physical dimensions of acoustics. Right! Like that doesn’t sound confusing! Basically, there are scientists out there conducting studies with actual human listeners. These humans’ listeners are listening for pitch, whereas frequency is measured in hertz. In other words, they hear loudness. Electronic measuring tools use hertz to measure frequency. Human listeners are going to respond to the “loudness” of something versus an electronic instrument. With both types of measuring devices (humans and electronic instruments), both will give different types of feedback in terms of future measuring for frequency and pitch.
4a & b) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting? Why? The part of this chapter that I liked least would probably be the section on isointensity curves and rate saturation. Isointensity curves are a map plotting the firing rate of an auditory nerve fiber against varying frequencies at a steady intensity. Rate saturation is the point at which a nerve fiber is firing as rapidly as possible and further stimulation is incapable of increasing the firing rate. If these two definitions didn’t throw you for a loop, you’re way smarter than I am. To further complicate this section of the chapter were discussions of different hertz levels. I’m not saying the section wasn’t at all interesting, I’m saying that this section was a lot to digest.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation/Perception? The part of this chapter that I think will prove to be the best thing to know is knowing the basic structures of the outer, middle, and inner ear, along with what structures contain and do specific jobs. I will probably be invaluable to learn about which structures have the most impact on other structures, either psychologically or their firing rate and responsibilities. This whole chapter is pretty important. I think if I can get a better handle on the differences between hertz, frequency, pitch, loudness, etc., and how these differences coincide with the various other structures of the “ear”, it will make future auditory chapters easier to understand.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters? Although this section is starting a different topic that the last few chapters, it builds upon them too. The book does an excellent job at comparing how we learned about other sensory topics, and infuses that information with new information. I like how the author starts out by giving us what he expects us to learn about in the following chapters, but also refers back to previous sensation/perception categories that intertwine what we’re about to learn.
7a & b) What topic would you like to learn more about? Why? As we were going around the room a few weeks ago, talking about what our inventions are going to be, someone had mentioned cochlear implant devices. I would like to know more about hearing loss. What are the causes, what genetics prove about hearing loss, what devices are out there now, or are in the development stages. I would like to have somewhat of an idea about how big of an impact hearing devices and provisions can be in the future. I would also like to know more about why children in a specific age range are more susceptible to ear infections.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter? As I was reading the end of the chapter, it talked about certain cancer drugs or antibiotics having an effect on our hearing, ototoxic. I was thinking back to when my sister was going through treatment of cancer before she passed away, and that her hearing had changed. It had gotten worse. She was only 39 years old when she passed. Her hearing had always been spot on; I started to wonder if it had anything to do with her medication and/or treatment.
TERMS: amplitude, frequency, loudness, pitch, hertz, auditory system, pinna, middle ear, inner ear, ossicles, malleus, incus, stapes, psychoacoustics, isointensity curves, rate saturation, loudness, cochlear implant devices, cochlea, hearing,
1. A) I found figure 9.4 interesting on things that we hear everyday and their intensity.
B) I thought this was interesting because it shows examples from things that are on the threshold of hearing to the threshold of pain.These different sound levels are measured by decibels.
2. A) I thought that conductive hearing loss was interesting.
B) I thought this was interesting because it deals with hearing loss because of problems with bones in the middle of the ear. This happens because of mucus during ear infection. It can lead to otits media.
3. A) I thought that otosclerosis was interesting.
B) I thought this was interesting because I wonder why those abnormal growths happen. It's good though that surgery can help and improve hearing.
4. A) I found the section about the basic structure of the auditory system least interesting.
B) I thought this was least interesting because I don't like learning the different parts of the body.
5. I think that knowing the structure of the auditory system and what each part does and how they work together will be most useful in understanding sensation and perception.
6. This chapter builds on by explaining hearing and sound. The loudness of sound and the pitch of the sound.
7. A) I would like to learn more about otitis media.
B) I would like to learn more about this because it's a common infection. I'm curious as to why it is common in children and not adults. I'm also surprised that reabsorption can take months.
8. While reading this chapter I was thinking about the things I hear every day and the amplitude or intensity of them and how it can affect my hearing.
9. Terms: amplitude, intensity, pitch, sound, loudness, hearing, sensation, perception, auditory system, otosclerosis, decibels, otitis media, conductive hearing loss.
(1ab) I actually gained a lot of interest in the general topic of hearing in the first couple paragraphs of this chapter. Sitting around with your friends you ask each other from time to time this question of : Could you imagine your life without this or that? Your answer is always sure, I think I could survive without it and boastfully you say it wouldn’t be that hard. Imagine survival without being able to hear. In your game of questions you would say you could do it, but could you actually survive when put in the scenario in real life. You never quite understand what people are going through (even though sometimes you think you do). People cannot fathom someones experiences such as not hearing, unless put in that exact experience. Imagine a world that doesn’t make a sound. You are stripped of your fundamental human abilities and everyday your life is filled with danger that you cannot avoid. Deafness deprives you, your only choice is to relatively isolate yourself to stay out of harms way. This topic was interesting to me because upon losing my sister, time after time people always said, “I can imagine what you are going through.” Truthfully to be courteous you agree and say thank you very much. But the words of that individual drive you bonkers until you just want scream and yell at them that they have never experienced what your going through. Losing my sister made me realize a lot, never take anything for granted because it could be gone tomorrow. Live your life to the fullest and cherish the moments. You have a gift of a healthy life, you come to realize that your life is really not to bad.
(2ab) Sine waves and complex sounds were interesting to me. I just figured you heard a sound and at different vibration levels your brain interpreted those sounds. I was unaware that each sound has a specific term associated with the complexity of that sound. All sounds, even as complex as the sounds produced by musical instruments, human speech, and city traffic, can be described as a combination of sine waves. The sound is described as a spectrum that displays how much energy, or amplitude, is present at multiple frequencies. Sounds with harmonic spectra, caused by simple vibrations such as a guitar string, contain a level of harmonic. The lowest frequency component is the fundamental frequency, all other harmonics have frequencies that are integer multiples of the fundaments. Different sounds are distinguish by the specific shape of the spectrum. We hear different sounds in our daily environments but the degree of intensity vary.
(3ab) The art of the auditory system interests me because the ear is a weird looking part of the body if you think of it. My knowledge of the anatomical structures and how we understand pressure changes is a broad topic. Breaking down our hearing environment is very interesting. The outer ear, which i thought was just cartilage, is the external sound gathering portion of the ear, consisting of the pinna and the ear canal. Sound waves are funneled through the pinna and through the ear canal. The middle ear consists of ossicles which are bones that amplify the sound waves. The inner ear is the most complex, sound pressure here is translated into neural signals that inform the listener of the world. The cochlea, the cochlear canals, and membranes are the major parts of the inner ear. Vibrations transmitted through the membranes cause stapes to push and pull the oval window at the base of the cochlea. Cochlear movements are translated into neural signals in the organ of Corti. This organ is made up of hair cells, dendrites, nerve fibers. These are all receptors like in the retina of the eye.
(4ab)One thing I didn’t find interesting was the topic of certain antibiotics and cancer drugs are ototoxic, producing adverse effects on cochlear or vestibular organs or nerves. This was not interesting to me because I recall the doctors distributing ototoxic drugs to my sister, she was in severe pain because the nerves in her arms, and ears were affected. But yet this was a side affect of a drug that was going to help her, reading about the ototoxic drugs brought back memories of the severe pain my sister had to endure and there was nothing the doctors could do to help with the pain it caused.
(5) Being deaf deprives you of your most fundamental human abilities. Understanding hearing will help you appreciate that biology has provided solutions to the challenges of sensing and interpreting sound. Our ears are always open, so we don’t get steady reminders of the importance of hearing in our daily lives.
(6) Previous chapters explained that humans are visual animals, we explored the topic of vision very thoroughly. Now we try to picture the world in this chapter where nothing makes a sound. Deafness deprives you of your most important fundamental human abilities. Without hearing, isolation from your environment, or constant assistance in your environment is needed.
(7ab) I would like to learn more about the auditory system of different animals. I want to understand why animals sense of hearing always seems to be more of high caliber compared to humans. What makes the ear of a certain animal more sensitive to vibration patterns present in their environment.
(8) An idea upon reading this that came to mind is why we sometimes at night assume we heard something, like a voice, is our brain or ears playing tricks on us? Can our minds be so use to a sound that sometimes the brain interprets the sound automatically without our knowledge? The brain I know sometimes triggers a ringing sound in the ear that is a sign that the brain is trying to repair itself but is failing.
(9) hearing, frequency, amplitude, intensity, sine wave, complex sounds, harmonic spectrum, fundamental frequency, timbre, pinna, outer ear, ear canal, middle ear, oval window, stapes, inner ear, ossicle, cochlea, cochlear canals, membranes, organ of corgi, round window, hair cell, ototoxic
1. One thing that I found interesting when reading through chapter 9 was that our ear actually decides how loud a sound is. Temporal integration is the process by which a sound at a constant level is perceived. There are different sections making of the ear these being the inner ear, middle ear, and outer ear. Sounds collected from the environment are by the pinna or also typically called the ear. Pinnae vary in shape and size across different mammals and play a vital role in our ability to localize sound waves. Once these sounds are processed, they travel into the middle ear and further into the inner ear. Any sound that is heard for a period of longer than 200 milliseconds will be perceived as louder the longer it is hear. I find all of this interesting because this is another thing that our brain/body does that we never stop to think about. We are hearing sounds every second of the day and our body is constantly adjusting to these sounds to prevent potential damage. I find it awesome how our bodies are designed to do this.
2. Another thing that I found interesting from chapter nine was the concept of white noise. White noise consists of all of the audible frequencies in the human auditory range in equal amounts. The way researchers utilize white noise to measure frequency selectivity is by presenting an individual with numerous noises at once to make the recognition of one single sound difficult. Like I just mentioned, we are presented with different noises of different pitches and tones at every second of the day but our auditory system only detects what it thinks to be the most important sound. Background noise is something that we as humans have become accustomed to and we actually function at our best with it. I find it interesting that when I am sitting in class listening to a professor lecture I can hear everything around me perfectly yet still have the ability to pick up on what the professor is saying as well as what the people around me are talking about.
3. Another concept from chapter nine that I found interesting was the section on hearing loss. There are different kinds of hearing loss that result from different reasons. Conductive hearing loss is caused by problems with the bones of the middle ear whereas otitis media is inflammation of the middle ear found commonly in children and otosclerosis is abnormal growth of the middle-ear bones that causes hearing loss. Sensorineural hearing loss is due to defects in the cochlea or auditory nerve. As you can tell these are all different types of hearing loss but they have their distinctive causes. According to the book, somewhere close to 30 million Americans suffer from some form of hearing impairment. Also, I found it interesting that the term thresholds made its way into the section about hearing loss. Now that I read about it, I now think it’s more common sense but I think it is neat that hearing loss doesn’t always mean the complete loss of hearing, but rather the elevation of sound thresholds. I always find it interesting to read about different defects our body can have.
4. I found this entire chapter to be really boring. Although how the ear works is fascinating, I did not need to read a whole chapter about it. I found it hard to pay attention and retain the information that I was reading. Several of the concepts from this chapter I found to be uninteresting and some of them were stuff about the auditory system. While reading this section I found it all hard to understand and to separate some of the different terms involved with it.
5. Although I found it hard to understand and not very interesting, I think knowing and understanding the auditory brain structures. This is important when understanding sensation and perception because it demonstrates the parts of the brain imperative for the sensation of hearing and our perception of noise. Knowing how our auditory brain structure works is one step closer in the direction to understand how our bodies work. The auditory brain structure does so much for our body to function properly and it is important to our well-being.
6. Chapter nine builds off of the previous chapters because it once again deals with sensation and perception but instead of talking more about vision and our visual systems, it starts to talk about sounds and hearing. Along with vision, hearing is another way that we sense and perceive things. This chapter begins to talk about the brain structures connected to our ears rather than our eyes. If I had to guess, we will be reading a lot more about the functions of our ears and our auditory system.
7. I would like to learn more about hearing deficits found in humans. Understanding the auditory system can help us understand why humans have certain hearing deficits and how to prevent them or help them in a way. I have always been interested in the things that can go wrong with our bodies and I think if we understand how our bodies work in the right way, it will aid us with understanding our bodies getting off balance and things going wrong.
8. The only thing I really thought about while reading this chapter was high pitch noises. I’ve had professors give my class the hearing test where they play different pitches of sounds and seeing where we could get on the scale before we couldn’t hear the pitch anymore. I find it interesting that as we age we lose our hearing. I understand why this would happen but I guess I have always sought a bigger and better explanation.
9. Terms: Temporal integration, inner ear, middle ear, outer ear, pinna, pinnae, frequency, sensation, perception, white noise, hearing loss, sound waves, auditory system, conductive hearing loss, otitis media, otosclerosis, sensorineural hearing loss, cochlea, auditory nerve.
1A) sensorineural hearing loss
1B) this interested me because of how many drugs we intake in our daily lives and how easily it would be for those drug to damage our ears. also hearing loss can be due to damage of the hair cells due to loud music. in the past this has not been a huge ordeal. but in this day in age its hard to find a person under lets say the age of about 30 who has not grown up with head phones. now head phones are getting smaller and able to produce much louder music as well.
2A) White noise
2B) this interested me because i always hear people talking about white noise and how they like listening to it when the do homework and other things. Its good to finally start to understand it a little bit more.
3A) ottis media
3B) this interested me because as a kid i had lots of ear infections and i wonder if this was a part of what i had to go through
4A) medical type parts
4B) learning about the ear is not a bad thing to learn just doesn't interest me all that much.
5) the thing i think is the most important for sensation and perception is understanding hearing loss. because it is something that is becoming more and more frequent.
6)this builds on the previous chapter is ways that it continues to tell us how our body works and how we use or sense and in this chapter it talks about the ears. and continues to talk about wave lengths and different diseases.
7A/B) I would like to learn more a about hearing loss due to louad music due to my generation always having ear buds in ass well as bluetooth mics in there ear almost 24/7
8) I kept thinking about my our hearing and how could any of the topics in the chapter could relate to me expectaily the otitis media becaus i had so many ear infections as a kid.
9) sensation, precetions, wave lenthts, ottis media, sensational hearing loss, white noise
Chapter 9 - Hearing: Physiology and psychoacoustics
1a) What did you find interesting? & 1b) Why was it interesting to you?
First of all, right from the beginning I realized I would like this chapter and the next three. Why? Because it changed, finally, learning something different. Hearing. And with hearing comes another type of perception. They should try to integrate seeing and hearing better so that the subjects and/or topics intertwine better. Thus, making it more interesting for the students.
Anyways, here are my three favorite things right in order, right from the beginning. And even though I got through my chapter quickly, I still read the rest of it.
First topic I found interesting - Loudness - defined as the psychological aspect of sound related to perceived intensity [amplitude {the magnitude of displacement (increase or decrease) of a sound pressure wave. Amplitude is perceived as loudness.}] Why? Because anything that deals with the psychological aspect of something else, I am intrigued by.
2a) What did you find interesting? & 2b) Why was it interesting to you?
Pitch - the psychological aspect of sound related mainly to perceived frequency. And I am intrigued by the term “psychological aspect” part of the definition, therefore, I want to know more about it.
3a) What did you find interesting? & 3b) Why was it interesting to you?
And finally decibel (dB)- a unit of measure for the physical intensity of sound. I am very interested in music and when I started reading about decibels, I remember seeing that type of conversion when it came to music. That is when I really began becoming interested.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
The labels/parts of the ear were uninteresting to me. I know there are very important but as a psychology major and where i intend my degree on taking me, I really don’t believe I will have the need to know that the “oval window is the flexible opening to the cochlea through which the stapes transmits vibration to the fluid inside.” And that is the plain truth.
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
Once again, I do not believe that knowing the parts of the ear are necessary in the field of psychology I am personally interested in. Or at least there are a lot of terms in chapter 9 of the ear like ear canal, pinna, ossicle, malleus, superior olive, mid pons, incus, and stapes that I do not think are necessary for me and te field I want to take my degree to.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Sensation / Perception?
Sounds are fluctuations of pressure and that sound waves are defined by the frequency and/or amplitude. I also read that humans and mammals can hear sound from far away/extreme intensities. Also hearing loss is caused by damage to the bones of the middle ear, to the hair cells in the cochlea, or to the neurons in the auditory nerve.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
Honestly, this chapter dealt with a whole different type of perception. Seeing and hearing are two completely different senses.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
I would like to know more about otitis media which is inflammation of the middle ear, commonly in children as a result of infection. And actually, I am affected by this three times a year.
7b) Why?
Because I am affected by this currently. And would like more information about remedies, treatment, and what can be done.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I thought about all the different aspects of hearing and sound. How infections have affected how I feel about my ears. I also realized that is why I am so protective of my childrens ears as well. I always try to protect my ears. I explain to people that they should not play with their hearing and never to stick anything in your ear. (I’m not sure if that is really what you were looking for but oh, well) .
Terms: Hearing, perception, psychology, superior olive, sound, mid pons, field, ear canal, loudness, pitch, auditory nerve, hair cells, neurons, cochlea, bones, hearing loss, pressure, sound waves, decibel (dB), unit, measure, sound, intensity, amplitude, infections, frequency, vibration, transmits, fluid, cochlea, ear, canal, pinna ossicles, malleus, incus, stapes, pressure, wave, remedies, and treatment.