Quantification of the sound response to the auditory system in which the acoustic transmission properties are dependent on the medium in the middle ear

Abstract

This study presented a quantitative evaluation index related to frequency responses for the diagnosis of otitis media. The signal paths for humans to perceive sound are classified into Bone Conduction and Air Conduction according to the paths through which vibration and sound are transmitted and mediated. Auditory components that can affect the signal characteristics in human auditory organs include temporal bone, ear canal, eardrum, and middle ear cavity. The specific acoustic impedance was obtained through simple model of the auditory components, and the sound transmission mechanism was implemented through the outer-middle ear circuit model. Frequency range matching the acoustic characteristics of each components were calculated, and the difference between the normal and otitis media patients was confirmed by deriving the nonlinear response between the input sound and the output sound in the frequency domain through the transfer function method. The reliability of the algorithm was confirmed through the ROC curve, and individual evaluation indexes were derived according to the priority factor between classification accuracy and error rate.