A study is reported of the effect of early visual experience on the development of auditory space perception. The spatial hearing of thirty-five children with visual disabilities (twenty-two with congenital total blindness) was compared with that of eighteen sighted children and seventeen sighted adults. The tests provided a comprehensive assessment of spatial-hearing ability, including psychophysical estimates of spatial resolution in the horizontal, vertical, and distance dimensions, as well as measures of reaching and walking to the locations of sound sources. The spatial hearing of the children with visual disabilities was comparable to or some-what better than that of the sighted children and adults. This pattern held even when the group with visual disabilities was restricted to those children with congenital total blindness; in fact, some of those children had exceptionally good spatial hearing. These findings imply that the developmental calibration of human spatial hearing is not dependent on a history of visual experience. It seems likely that this calibration arises from the experience of changes in sound-localization cues arising from self-motion, such as turning the head or walking. As a practical matter, orientation and mobility instructors may reasonably assume that individuals with visual disabilities can use their hearing effectively in day-to-day travel situations.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AdelsonEFraibergS, 1974“Gross motor development in infants blind from birth”Child Development45114–126
2.
AdelsonEFraibergS, 1976“Sensory deficit and motor development in infants blind from birth”, in The Effects of Blindness and Other Impairments on Early Development Ed. JastrzembskaZ S, (New York: American Foundation for the Blind) pp 1–15
3.
AmmonsC HWorchelPDallenbachK M, 1953“Facial vision: The perception of obstacles out of doors by blindfolded and blindfolded-deafened subjects”American Journal of Psychology66519–553
4.
AshmeadD HDavisD LNorthingtonA, 1995“The contribution of listeners' approaching motion to auditory distance perception”Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance21239–256
5.
AshmeadD HDavisD LWhalenTOdomR D, 1991“Sound localization and sensitivity to interaural time differences in human infants”Child Development621211–1226
AslinR N, 1981“Experiential influences and sensitive periods in development: A unified model”, in Development of Perceptionvolume 2 Eds AslinR NAlbertsJ RPetersenM R, (New York: Academic Press) pp 45–93
8.
CliftonR K, 1992“The development of spatial hearing in human infants”, in Developmental Psychoacoustics Eds WernerL ARubelE W, (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association) pp 135–157
9.
CliftonR KGwiazdaJBauerJClarksonMHeldR, 1988“Growth in head size during infancy: Implications for sound localization”Developmental Psychology24477–483
10.
CliftonR KMuirD WAshmeadD HClarksonM G, 1993“Is visually guided reaching in early infancy a myth?”Child Development641099–1110
11.
CurtisJ FWinerD M, 1969“The auditory abilities of the blind as compared with the sighted”Auditory Research957–59
12.
FisherG H, 1964“Spatial localization by the blind”American Journal of Psychology772–14
13.
FraibergS, 1977Insights from the Blind: Comparative Studies of Blind and Sighted Infants (New York: Basic Books)
14.
FraibergSSiegelB LGibsonR, 1966“The role of sound in the search behavior of a blind infant”Psychoanalytic Study of the Child21327–357
15.
GibsonJ J, 1966The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin)
16.
GottliebG, 1976“The roles of experience in the development of behavior and the nervous system”, in Neural and Behavioral Specificity Ed. GottliebG, (New York: Academic Press) pp 25–54
17.
GuthD AHillE WRieserJ J, 1989“Tests of blind pedestrians' use of traffic sounds for street-crossing alignment”Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness83461–468
18.
HayesS P, 1935“Where did that sound come from?”Teacher's Forum747–51
19.
HillE WPonderP, 1976Orientation and Mobility Techniques: A Guide for the Practitioner (New York: American Foundation for the Blind)
20.
JonesB, 1975“Spatial perception in the blind”British Journal of Psychology66461–472
21.
KellogW N, 1962“Sonar system of the blind”Science13399–404
22.
KeppelG, 1991Design and Analysis. A Researchers Handbook (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall) p. 287
23.
KingA JCarlileS, 1993“Changes induced in the representation of auditory space in the superior colliculus by rearing ferrets with binocular eyelid suture”Experimental Brain Research94444–455
24.
KnudsenE IBrainardM S, 1995“Creating a unified representation of visual and auditory space in the brain”Annual Review of Neuroscience1819–43
25.
KnudsenE IEsterlyS Ddu LacS, 1991“Stretched and upside-down maps of auditory space in the optic tectum of blind-reared owls; acoustic basis and behavioral correlates”Journal of Neuroscience111727–1747
26.
KorteMRauscheckerJ P, 1993“Auditory spatial tuning of cortical neurons is sharpened in cats with early blindness”Journal of Neurophysiology701717–1721
27.
KujalaTAlhoKPaavilainenPSummalaHNäätänenR, 1992“Neural plasticity in processing of sound location by the early blind: An event-related potential study”Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology84469–472
28.
LeeD N, 1990“Getting around with light or sound”, in Perception and Control of Self motion Ed. WertheimR W A, (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates)
29.
LitovskyR, 1997“Developmental changes in the precedence effect: Estimates of minimum audible angle”Journal of the Acoustical Society of America1021739–1745
30.
MershonD HBallengerW LLittleA DMcMurtryP L, 1989“Effects of room reflectance and background noise on perceived auditory distance”Perception18403–416
31.
MiddlebrooksJ CGreenD M, 1991“Sound localization by human listeners”Annual Review of Psychology42135–159
32.
MillsA W, 1972“Auditory localization”, in Foundations of Modern Auditory Theoryvolume 2 Ed. TobiasJ V, (New York: Academic Press) pp 301–345
33.
MuchnikCEfratiMNemethEMalinMHildesheimerM, 1991“Central auditory skills in blind and sighted subjects”Scandinavian Audiology2019–23
34.
NiemeyerWStarlingerI, 1981“Do the blind hear better? Investigations on auditory processing in congenital or early acquired blindness”Audiology20503–515
35.
RauscheckerJ PHarrisL R, 1983“Auditory compensation of the effects of visual deprivation in the cat's superior colliculus”Experimental Brain Research5069–83
36.
RauscheckerJ PKniepertU, 1994“Auditory localization behavior in visually deprived cats”European Journal of Neuroscience6149–160
37.
RauscheckerJ PKorteM, 1993“Auditory compensation of early visual deprivation in the cat's anterior ectosylvian cortex”Journal of Neuroscience134538–4558
38.
RiceC E, 1967“Human echo perception”Science155656–664
39.
RiceC E, 1969“Perceptual enhancement in the early blind?”Psychological Record191–14
40.
RiceC E, 1970“Early blindness, early experience and perceptual enhancement”American Foundation for the Blind: Research Bulletin221–22
41.
RiceC EFeinsteinS H, 1965“Sonar system of the blind: Size discrimination”Science1481107–1108
42.
RiceC EFeinsteinS HSchustermannR J, 1965“Echo-detection ability of the blind: Size and distance factors”Journal of Experimental Psychology70246–251
43.
RieserJ JHillE WTalorC RBradfieldARosenS, 1992“Visual experience, visual field size, and the development of nonvisual sensitivity to the spatial structure of outdoor neighborhoods explored by walking”Journal of Experimental Psychology: General121210–221
44.
RieserJ JLockmanJ JPickH L, 1980“The role of visual experience in knowledge of spatial layout”Perception & Psychophysics28185–190
45.
RosenblumL DWuestefeldA PSaldanaH M, 1993“Auditory looming perception: Influences on anticipatory judgments”Perception221467–1482
46.
SpeigleJ MLoomisJ M, 1993“Auditory distance perception by translating observers”Proceedings of IEEE 1993 Symposium on Research Frontiers in Virtual Reality (Los Alamitos, CA: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Computer Society) pp 92–99
47.
SpigelmanM N, 1976“A comparative study of the effects of early blindness on the development of auditory-spatial learning”, in The Effects of Blindness and Other Impairments on Early Development Ed. JastrzembskaZ S, (New York: American Foundation for the Blind) pp 29–63
48.
SpigelmanM NBrydenM P, 1967“Effects of early and late blindness on auditory spatial learning in the rat”Neuropsychologia5267–274
49.
TonningF M, 1975“Ability of the blind to localize noise”Scandinavian Audiology4183–186
50.
VeraartCWanet-DefalqueM-C, 1987“Representation of motor space by the blind”Perception & Psychophysics42132–139
51.
WanetM CVeraartC, 1985“Processing of auditory information by the blind in spatial localization tasks”Perception & Psychophysics3891–96
52.
WarrenD H, 1984Blindness and Early Childhood Development2nd edition, revised (New York: American Foundation for the Blind) pp 70–76
53.
WarrenD H, 1994Blindness and Children. An Individual Differences Approach (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) pp 12–29
54.
WarrenD HPickH L, 1970“Intermodality relations in localization in blind and sighted people”Perception & Psychophysics8430–433
55.
WhithingtonD J, 1992“The effect of binocular lid suture on auditory responses in the guinea-pig superior colliculus”Neuroscience Letters136153–156
56.
WorchelPMauneyJAndrewJ G, 1950“The perception of obstacles by the blind”Journal of Experimental Psychology40746–751
