Loudness constancy in healthy older adults

Loudness constancy refers to the phenomenon by which loudness remains constant in the presence of substantial changes in a physical stimulus caused by varying the sound distance.When visual indications of musical performance are accessible, sound generation exhibits robust loudness constancy in adults aged 18-43 years; however, whether this result can be obtained for older adults is unclear.In this study, we aimed to assess whether older adults (aged 65 years) had strong loudness constancy.We used two adjustment approach methods to determine the degree of loudness constancy.One was "sound production," which required listeners to play the musical instrument as loudly as a model musician.The other was "sound-level adjustment," in which listeners changed the loudness of a loudspeaker's output.Our results showed that when visual cues were present, older adults exhibited robust loudness constancy while playing a musical instrument.These findings provide evidence for the generalizability of previous results for older adults and extend the idea that audiovisual perception and imitation are important for music learning and skill acquisition in older adults.