The Psychoacoustic Perception of Distance in Monophonic and Binaural Music

Music plays an important role in immersive environments. With the rise in immersive technology, scientists in the field have been researching how music is perceived in extended reality (XR), in an attempt to improve the authenticity of audiovisual experiences. The auditory perception of distance is an important issue in 3D virtual environments but has been considered an obscure area. The study aims to compare monophonic and binaural signals for more accurate localization, over different types of music audio sources. A preliminary listening test was conducted with five different types of music sources in Near, Medium, and Far locations. The results indicate that some localization cues gain more relevance than others, depending on the distance that an audio signal originates from. The direct-to-reverberant energy ratio, in conjunction with binaural processing, contributes significantly to conveying the distance perception of a sound. It is also concluded that distant signals are better perceived as being distant if the sound signal is mono rather than binaural. The findings of this study contribute to the development of psychoacoustic research in XR environments.