In humans the Auditory receptors act by i jH the phenomenon of 'Masking&;

Auditory masking occurs when the perception of one sound is affected by the presence of another sound. Auditory masking in the frequency domain is known as simultaneous masking, frequency masking or spectral masking. Auditory masking in the time domain is known as temporal masking or non-simultaneous masking Ref: guyton and hall textbook of medical physiology 12 edition page number:639,640,641