Timbre as Identity

• switch away from discussion of state cues to identity learning
  
  
• timbre is of broad importance in allowing listeners to recognize or distinguish otherwise similar sounds
  
  
  • E.g. recognizing different people by the sounds of their voices
    
    
  • E.g. laundry worker learns to distinguish the sound of the rinse cycle for individual washing machines
    
    
  • E.g. parent may find it useful to identify the sound of their son's Honda from their daughter's Ford
    
    
• these discrimination skills must be learned

the motivation to discriminate sounds
the ability to detect distinctive features