Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer?
Self-motion is an essential but often overlooked component of sound localisation. As the directional information of a source is implicitly contained in head-centred acoustic cues, that acoustic input needs to be continuously combined with sensorimotor information about the head orientation in order...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2025-01-01
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| Series: | PLoS Computational Biology |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012108 |
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| author | Glen McLachlan Piotr Majdak Jonas Reijniers Michael Mihocic Herbert Peremans |
| author_facet | Glen McLachlan Piotr Majdak Jonas Reijniers Michael Mihocic Herbert Peremans |
| author_sort | Glen McLachlan |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Self-motion is an essential but often overlooked component of sound localisation. As the directional information of a source is implicitly contained in head-centred acoustic cues, that acoustic input needs to be continuously combined with sensorimotor information about the head orientation in order to decode to a world-centred frame of reference. When utilised, head movements significantly reduce ambiguities in the directional information provided by the incoming sound. In this work, we model human active sound localisation (considering small head rotations) as an ideal observer. In the evaluation, we compared human performance obtained in a free-field active localisation experiment with the predictions of a Bayesian model. Model noise parameters were set a-priori based on behavioural results from other studies, i.e., without any post-hoc parameter fitting to behavioural results. The model predictions showed a general agreement with actual human performance. However, a spatial analysis revealed that the ideal observer was not able to predict localisation behaviour for each source direction. A more detailed investigation into the effects of various model parameters indicated that uncertainty on head orientation significantly contributed to the observed differences. Yet, the biases and spatial distribution of the human responses remained partially unexplained by the presented ideal observer model, suggesting that human sound localisation is sub-optimal. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-68be991b2b764b6ea88c5fb2685dd5d9 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1553-734X 1553-7358 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLoS Computational Biology |
| spelling | doaj-art-68be991b2b764b6ea88c5fb2685dd5d92025-02-05T05:30:39ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS Computational Biology1553-734X1553-73582025-01-01211e101210810.1371/journal.pcbi.1012108Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer?Glen McLachlanPiotr MajdakJonas ReijniersMichael MihocicHerbert PeremansSelf-motion is an essential but often overlooked component of sound localisation. As the directional information of a source is implicitly contained in head-centred acoustic cues, that acoustic input needs to be continuously combined with sensorimotor information about the head orientation in order to decode to a world-centred frame of reference. When utilised, head movements significantly reduce ambiguities in the directional information provided by the incoming sound. In this work, we model human active sound localisation (considering small head rotations) as an ideal observer. In the evaluation, we compared human performance obtained in a free-field active localisation experiment with the predictions of a Bayesian model. Model noise parameters were set a-priori based on behavioural results from other studies, i.e., without any post-hoc parameter fitting to behavioural results. The model predictions showed a general agreement with actual human performance. However, a spatial analysis revealed that the ideal observer was not able to predict localisation behaviour for each source direction. A more detailed investigation into the effects of various model parameters indicated that uncertainty on head orientation significantly contributed to the observed differences. Yet, the biases and spatial distribution of the human responses remained partially unexplained by the presented ideal observer model, suggesting that human sound localisation is sub-optimal.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012108 |
| spellingShingle | Glen McLachlan Piotr Majdak Jonas Reijniers Michael Mihocic Herbert Peremans Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? PLoS Computational Biology |
| title | Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? |
| title_full | Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? |
| title_fullStr | Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? |
| title_short | Bayesian active sound localisation: To what extent do humans perform like an ideal-observer? |
| title_sort | bayesian active sound localisation to what extent do humans perform like an ideal observer |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012108 |
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