Auditory illusion
Auditory illusions are false perceptions of a real sound or outside stimulus.[1] These false perceptions are the equivalent of an optical illusion: the listener hears either sounds which are not present in the stimulus, or sounds that should not be possible given the circumstance on how they were created.[2]
Humans are fairly susceptible to
Causes
Many auditory illusions, particularly of music and of speech, result from hearing sound patterns that are highly probable, even though they are heard incorrectly. This is due to the influence of our knowledge and experience of many sounds we have heard.[8] In order to prevent hearing echo created by perceiving multiple sounds coming from different spaces, the human auditory system relates the sounds as being from one source.[9] However, that does not prevent people from being fooled by auditory illusions. Sounds that are found in words are called embedded sounds, and these sounds are the cause of some auditory illusions. A person's perception of a word can be influenced by the way they see the speaker's mouth move, even if the sound they hear is unchanged.[10] For example, if someone is looking at two people saying "far" and "bar", the word they will hear will be determined by who they look at.[11] If these sounds are played in a loop, the listener will be able to hear different words inside the same sound.[12] People with brain damage can be more susceptible to auditory illusions and they can become more common for that person.[13]
In music
Composers have long been using the spatial components of music to alter the overall sound experienced by the listener.[14] One of the more common methods of sound synthesis is the use of combination tones. Combination tones are illusions that are not physically present as sound waves, but rather, they are created by one's own neuromechanics.[15] According to Purwins,[16] auditory illusions have been used effectively by the following: Beethoven (Leonore Overture), Berg (Wozzeck), Krenek (Spiritus Intelligentiae, Sanctus), Ligeti (Études), Violin Concerto, Double Concerto, for flute, oboe and orchestra), Honegger (Pacific 231), and Stahnke (Partota 12).
Examples
There are a multitude of examples out in the world of auditory illusions. These are examples of some auditory illusions:
- Binaural beats
- The constant spectrum melody
- Deutsch's scale illusion
- Electronic voice phenomenon: a special case of auditory pareidolia
- Franssen effect
- Glissando illusion
- Illusory continuity of tones
- Illusory discontinuity
- Hearing a missing fundamental frequency, given other parts of the harmonic series
- Various psychoacoustic tricks of lossy audio compression
- McGurk effect
- Octave illusion/Deutsch's high–low illusion
- Auditory pareidolia: hearing indistinct voices in random noise.
- The Deutsch tritone paradox
- Speech-to-song illusion
- Yanny or Laurel
See also
- Auditory system
- Barber pole– auditory illusions compared to visual illusions
- Diana Deutsch
- Doppler effect – not an illusion, but real physical phenomenon
- Holophonics
- Jean-Claude Risset
- Musical acoustics
- Phantom rings
- Pitch circularity
- Psychoacoustics
- Sharawadji effect
- Tinnitus
References
- .
- ^ "Auditory illusion: How our brains can fill in the gaps to create continuous sound". Science Daily. Retrieved February 20, 2019.
- JSTOR 26385737.
- PMID 15733204.
- S2CID 7486290.
- ^ Massaro, Dominic W., ed. (2007). "What Are Musical Paradox and Illusion?" (PDF). American Journal of Psychology. 120 (1). University of California, Santa Cruz: 124, 132. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2022-10-09. Retrieved 15 November 2013.
- JSTOR 24939602.
- LCCN 2018051786.
- ISBN 978-1-4129-4081-8, retrieved 2020-11-08
- ^ "Auditory Illusions: How your ears can be fooled". hear.com. Retrieved 2019-04-19.
- ^ "Do You Hear What I Hear? Amazing Auditory Illusions Explained". IFLScience. Retrieved 2019-04-21.
- ISSN 0001-4966.
- S2CID 8928159.
- S2CID 191375886.
- S2CID 15744586.
- ^ Purwins, Hendrik (2005). Profiles of pitch classes circularity of relative pitch and key-experiments, models, computational music analysis, and perspectives (PDF). pp. 110–120. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2022-10-09.