Effect of Stimulus Rise Time on the Latency of the Auditory Brainstem Response

Abstract

Three experiments were made on the effect of stimulus rise time on the latency of the most prominent positive deflection of the auditory brainstem response. In the experiment 1, tone bursts of fixed intensity and duration were presented at various rise times of 1 to 9 msec. The latency of the response increased with an increase in the stimulus rise time. In the experiments 2 and 3, tone bursts and pips with a rise of a given slope were presented at various rise times of 0.5-1 to 5-10 cycles. The response latency was almost invariable in the change of the stimulus rise time. The results suggested that the appearance of the response was mainly attributed to the initial 0.5-1 cycle of the stimulus tones. The successive part of the stimulus seemed not to take part in evoking the response so far as the initial part was intensive enough to elicite the response.