The cost of simplicity: comparing sounds in the lab vs. everyday environment

How do the sounds encountered in lab-based experiments compare with those heard in everyday listening? A detailed survey of non-speech auditory perception stimuli from 1000+ experiments in prominent journals showed approximately 90% are simplistic tones with minimal temporal variation (Schutz & Gillard Scientific Reports, 10(1) 9520, 2020). To contextualize that finding, here we apply a similar framework for classifying a corpus of everyday sounds drawn from two sources: (a) recordings intentionally selected to represent common sound events organized by Norman-Haignere et al. Neuron, 88(6) 1281-1296, (2015), and (b) recordings from two million + YouTube videos by Gemmeke et al. (2017). We found that 87% of non-speech sounds in this sample exhibit complex, time-varying characteristics—which are found in less than 11% of non-speech auditory perception stimuli. As these results provide clear documentation of a profound disconnect between what the auditory system encounters in everyday listening and how it is studied in laboratories, we conclude by reviewing an emerging body of research exploring ways in which sounds lacking temporal complexity fail to fully reveal the auditory system’s limits and capabilities. This demonstrates the risks inherent in attempting to draw generalized conclusions about the auditory system from a body of research focused overwhelmingly on a single type of stimulus.