Vestibular Influence on Human Auditory Space Perception

Abstract

We investigated the effect of vestibular stimulation on the lateralization of dichotic sound by cold-water irrigation of the external auditory canal in human subjects. Subjects adjusted the interaural level difference of the auditory stimulus to the subjective median plane of the head. In those subjects in whom dizziness and nystagmus indicated sufficient vestibular stimulation, these adjustments were significantly shifted toward the cooled ear compared with the control condition (irrigation with water at body temperature); i.e., vestibular stimulation induced a shift of the sound image toward the nonstimulated side. The mean magnitude of the shift was 7.3 dB immediately after vestibular stimulation and decreased to 2.5 dB after 5 min. As shown by an additional control experiment, this effect cannot be attributed to a unilateral hearing loss induced by cooling of the auditory periphery. The results indicate the involvement of vestibular afferent information in the perception of sound location during movements of the head and/or the whole body. We thus hypothesize that vestibular information is used by central-nervous mechanisms generating a world-centered representation of auditory space.