Neural correlates of sound externalization

When we listen to sounds through headphones without utilizing special transforms, sound sources seem to be located inside our heads. The sound sources are said to be lateralized to one side or the other to varying degree. This internal lateralization is different than sound source localization in the natural environment in which the sound is localized distal to the head. We used fMRI to investigate difference in neural responses between lateralization and localization. Individualized binaural recordings were used as externalized auditory stimuli and stereo recordings were used as internalized auditory stimuli. Brain activity was measured while 14 participants performed an active auditory localization task and while 12 participants performed a stimulus type identification task. Irrespective of the task condition, we observed enhanced activity in the bilateral posterior temporal gyri (pSTG) for the externalized stimuli relative to the internalized stimuli. Region of interest analysis indicated that both left and right pSTG were more sensitive to sound sources in contra- than ipsilateral hemifields. Moreover, greater back than front activity was also found in the left pSTG. Compared to impoverished spatial auditory stimuli, realistic spatial auditory stimuli enhance neural responses in the pSTG. This may be why we could observe contralateral hemifield preference in bilateral pSTG that many previous studies have failed to observe. Overall, the results indicate the importance of using ecologically valid stimuli for investigating neural processes in human cortex.