Source: http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200409/s1197602.htm

Left, right ears attuned to different sounds

Scientists in the United States have found that the right ear is better at picking up speech-like sounds and the left is more attuned to music, after studying the hearing of babies.

It has long been known that the right and left halves of the brain process sound differently.

However, those differences have been thought to stem from cellular properties unique to each brain hemisphere.

The new research suggests that the differences start at the ear.

"We always assumed that our left and right ears worked exactly the same way," lead researcher Yvonne Sininger, of the University of California, said.

"As a result, we tended to think it didn't matter which ear was impaired in a person.

"Now we see that it may have profound implications for the individual's speech and language development."

The discovery, which is described in the current issue of Science magazine, will help doctors enhance speech and language development in hearing-impaired newborns and the rehabilitation of persons with hearing loss.

Professor Sininger and her colleagues studied hearing in more than 3,000 newborns, specifically tiny amplifiers located in the outer hair cells of the inner ear.

These cells contract and expand to amplify sound vibrations, convert the vibrations to neural cells and send them to the brain.

The scientists inserted tiny probes into the babies' ears that emitted two different types of sounds and measured the amplified vibrations.

They found that speech-like clicks triggered greater amplification in the right ear, while music-like sustained tones were more greatly amplified by the left ear.

"We were intrigued to discover that the clicks triggered more amplification in the baby's right ear, while the tones induced more amplification in the baby's left ear," Professor Sininger said.

"This parallels how the brain processes speech and music, except the sides are reversed due to the brain's cross connections."

Very interesting. Wonder if any of it's really true. Hmmmmmmmmmm. Good article to make you think.

Its a really interesting article Semi. In fact I saw it myself a couple of days ago and posted it on the Steinberg/Cubase forum. This would deffinitely put a twist on mixing stereo sound. When I get around to it I would like to experiment with this! Apparantly this may be the reason why big name studio engineers recommend mastering in Mono.

Chony

SemiLiveMusic: thanks for sharing the intriguing article. Food for thought. - Scott

So the old classic rock bands, Beatles and such, had it right the whole time. Huge panning! Put the instruments on the left and the harmony vocals on the right!

Does that mean I have to put a monitor for my keyboards on my left side and a monitor for my vocals on my right side?

Now if they can only cure my two left feet, I'll be all set.

Al

I hated this and stayed a mono-fan untill the real stereorecording emerged. (So my Beatles-records are mono). What does that say about my ears?




------------------
drdalet

Big name studio engineers, when mastering in Stereo they also have to be aware of Mono compatibility. They don't master in Mono... but sometimes they change to Mono only to check the result.

Luis Santos

Now what... they gonna have music in left speaker and vocals in the right?

but...maybe slightly more vocals to the right more music to the left, or vise versa,(any studio owners tried it?)

Oh, another idea: next time I will need to try to get(or try to copy) exacly what the music on CD is playing,... I`ll use my left ear.

[This message has been edited by Vadim (edited 09-15-2004).]