The Performance of Echolocation: Acoustic Images Perceived by Echolocating Bats

Abstract

The performance of echolocation in bats is a measure of the effectiveness of this system of orientation for representing significant features of objects in perceptual images. Performance refers specifically to the quality and content of these images - - to the features of targets which bats can perceive as distinctive and to the acuity of perception of these features under different circumstances. A description of the performance of echolocation is, in effect, a description of what bats can ``see'' with their sonar.