EFFECTS OF HEARING PROTECTORS ON AUDITORY LOCALIZATION IN AZIMUTH AND ELEVATION

This paper describes an experiment conducted to determine the effects of 2 types of hearing protectors on auditory localization performance. Six listeners localized a 750-ms broadband noise from loudspeakers ranging in azimuth from -180 deg. to +180 deg. and in elevation from -75 deg. to +90 deg. Independent variables included the type of hearing protector and the elevation of the source. Dependent measures included azimuth error, elevation error, and the percentage of trials resulting in a front-back confusion. Performance on each of the dependent measures was found to be mediated by 1 or more of the independent variables.