A HALF-CENTURY’S PERSPECTIVE ON BÉKÉSY TRACKING AND LOUDNESS GROWTH AT THRESHOLD

In the more than half a century since Georg von Békésy was awarded the Nobel Prize, many of his findings have stood the test of time. Implications of the width of the excursions in the Békésy tracking procedure, however, are not as simple as described in his classic book, Experiments in Hearing (von Békésy, 1960). The interpretations of his findings have created some misunderstandings in hearing science and audiology. This article reviews a large body of data on Békésy tracking and more recent threshold, discrimination, and loudness data in order to answer the following question: Is the width of the excursions a reliable indicator of cochlear pathology? In 1947, von Békésy described a new audiometer and claimed that this new audiometer permitted the testing of recruitment. Recruitment has been defined as a rapid growth in loudness above the threshold of hearing (Fowler,1936; Steinberg and Gardner, 1937; Brunt, 1994) and was believed to be associated with all cochlear hearing losses (Dix, Hallpike, and Hood, 1948). The audiometer was automated. As the frequency of the signal increased slowly, the subject pressed a button when the signal was audible and released it when inaudible. This pressing an