Audibility of individual reflections in a complete sound field, III

This paper reports on the influence of individual reflections on the auditory localization of a loudspeaker in a small room. The sound field produced by a single loudspeaker positioned in a normal listening room has been simulated using an electroacoustic setup. The setup models the direct sound, seventeen individual reflections, and the reverberant field. The threshold of detection was measured using the method of adjustment for five reflections. The thresholds have been measured for two simulated situations: (1) A loudspeaker with frequency-independent directivity characteristics and frequency-independent absorption coefficients of the room surfaces, and (2) a loudspeaker with directivity according to a standard two-way system and absorption coefficients according to real materials. The results have shown that subjects can distinguish reliably between timbre and localization, that the spectrum level above 2 kHz for individual reflections determines their influence on the localization of the main source, and that only the first-order floor reflection will contribute to localization of the main source.