Effects of auditory imagery on the detection of a pure tone in white noise: experimental evidence of the auditory Perky effect

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine whether the auditory image of a pure tone facilitates or interferes with the auditory perception of the pure tone. The masked threshold of a pure tone in white noise with and without the image of a pure tone was compared. It was shown that, in contrast to Farah and Smith's (1983) finding of facilitation, imagery interfered with the detection of the pure tone only when the frequency of the imagined tone and the detected tone was the same. This interference was interpreted as showing the assimilation of the signal tone into imagery, i.e., the effect described by Perky in 1910, occurred in the auditory modality. An explanation of the differences between findings of interference and facilitation is offered.