Loudness decay (fwd)

[Ron Blue]

On 10 Dec 1995, Eric Smith wrote:
> In article <199512080614.AAA03993 at curly.cc.utexas.edu>,
> Jeffrey G. Sirianni <sirianni at UTS.CC.UTEXAS.EDU> wrote:
> >Greater decay in the high frequencies indicates a cochlear lesion and not a
> >retrocochlear lesion
> The decay also happened in a promontory stimulation test which was part
> of an evaluation to see if a cochlear implant would be indicated.
> Therefore, the cochlea itself is not the cause of the strange
> symptoms.  It's either the auditory nerve or the brain.
> I wonder if it could somehow be caused by adapting to tinnitus.  Since
> tinnitus tends to sound like a steady tone or other steady sound, could
> it be that the auditory nerve and/or auditory processing in the brain
> has learned to filter out all steady tones and other steady sounds that
> last more than a couple of minutes?  The fact that the sound comes back
> to full loudness instantly if it's interrupted for even a fraction of a
> second seems to support this.
I think there is merit to your idea for tinnitus/steady tone.  I believe
tinnitus is due to opponent wavelets being activated due to 
hypersensitization from lack of stimulation due to nerve damage.
Ron Blue