Numerous studies highlight the role of transient behavior in musical sounds and its impact on sound identification. This study compares these findings with established psychoacoustic measurements of detection thresholds for asynchrony in onset and offset transients, obtained using synthesized stimuli that allowed precise control of stimulus parameters. Results indicated that onset asynchrony can be detected at thresholds as low as 1 ms—even half a cycle of the component frequency. In contrast, offset asynchrony detection was found to be less precise, with thresholds ranging from 5 to 10 ms. Sensitivity improves when multiple harmonics are asynchronous. Additionally, component phase significantly influences onset asynchrony detection: at 1000 Hz and above, phase shifts raise thresholds from below 1 ms to around 50 ms, while having little effect on offset detection. Although these findings were based on controlled artificial stimuli, they can provide valuable insight into asynchrony in natural musical sounds. In many cases, detection thresholds are well below the variations observed in music, yet under certain conditions and frequencies, some temporal variations may become not perceptible.
