ABSTRACT
The final stage of the model converts the fast flowing neural activity patterns of periodic sounds into stabilised auditory images through a process referred to as triggered, quantized, temporal integration (Patterson & Holdsworth, 1990, 1991). In essence, the larger peaks in each channel of the neural activity pattern are used as strobe pulses for the integration process. When they occur, a portion of the neural activity pattern in that channel is transferred as a unit to the corresponding channel of the auditory image and added point for point to what is already there. When a sound is periodic, the strobe pulses are synchronised to the period of the wave and the sections of the neural pattern transferred to the image are all very similar. They are also aligned and, as a result, they accumulate to form an auditory image that is stationary even though the neural activity pattern is streaming past at a rapid rate.
