Sound Science Convention to Be Held in San Antonio

The scientific field of acoustics – the science of sound – will get a considerable boost at the end of next month, as experts will convene at the 158th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA). Several highlights from the planned schedule have already been made available, and it appears that some major research is going to be showcased during the four days of conference. According to the organizers, the results presented in San Antonio, Texas, will influence fields of research as diverse as medicine, music, psychology, engineering, speech communication, and marine biology.

Among the most interesting highlights of the coming event, organizers mention, for instance, a study about how video-game sounds trigger panic attacks. “The auditory brainstem response (ABR) was recorded during simultaneous binaural presentation of two types of sounds. Implications include (1) possible new evidence of the effect of selective attention on the ABR, (2) the potential for using auditory stressors to study the central physiology of emotional responses in humans, and (3) clues to physiological correlates of the effects of certain video games known to evoke panic attacks in susceptible players,” the abstract of the new research reads.

As far as the field of medicine goes, a new research will detail how new, ultrasound technologies have the ability to dislodge kidney stones, a very serious condition. According to the study's abstract, “Residual kidney stone fragments often remain months after treatment. These fragments may nucleate new stones and contribute to a 50% recurrence within 5 years. Here, a research focused ultrasound device was used to generate fragment motion with the goal of facilitating passage.”

Another interesting investigation deals with people's ability to adapt to foreign accents. “Finally, we demonstrated that exposure to multiple accents (e.g., Korean‐, Hindi‐, Mandarin‐, and Romanian‐accented English) can facilitate accent‐independent adaptation, i.e., adaptation to both a trained accented (Mandarin‐accented English) and an untrained accent (Slovakian‐accented English). This work builds a strong case for highly flexible speech perception mechanisms,” the paper says.

The Acoustical Society of America is the premier, international scientific society in acoustics devoted to the science of technology of sound. Its 7,500 members worldwide represent a broad spectrum of the study of acoustics. ASA publications include The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America (the world's leading journal on acoustics), Acoustics Today magazine, books and standards on acoustics. The society also holds two major scientific meetings each year.