Kazuo Ueda
Relative pitch judgments for formant
structured broadband noise
Abstract:The effect of formant structure on pitch of broadband
noise was investigated. Series of stimuli whose formant
structures were modified systematically, were constructed by
means of filtering. Single formant stimuli (Experiment 1) and
three formant stimuli (Experiment 2) were generated. Paired
comparison was used to assess the pitch of the stimulus. The
data were analyzed by a multidimensional scaling technique.
The results show that the spectral energy distribution (the
frequency and the level of the formants) of the stimuli affect
pitch, and that the second formant frequency is not the sole
determinant of pitch of broadband noise. This is contrary to
previous results on pitch of whispered vowels. The close
relation among the psychological dimension of noise pitch,
tone height, and sharpness was suggested.