The slope of the psychometric function and non-stationarity of thresholds in spatiotemporal contrast vision

Stuart Wallis, Daniel Baker, Tim Meese, Mark Georgeson

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The slope of the two-interval, forced-choice psychometric function (e.g. the Weibull parameter, ß) provides valuable information about the relationship between contrast sensitivity and signal strength. However, little is known about how or whether ß varies with stimulus parameters such as spatiotemporal frequency and stimulus size and shape. A second unresolved issue concerns the best way to estimate the slope of the psychometric function. For example, if an observer is non-stationary (e.g. their threshold drifts between experimental sessions), ß will be underestimated if curve fitting is performed after collapsing the data across experimental sessions. We measured psychometric functions for 2 experienced observers for 14 different spatiotemporal configurations of pulsed or flickering grating patches and bars on each of 8 days. We found ß ˜ 3 to be fairly constant across almost all conditions, consistent with a fixed nonlinear contrast transducer and/or a constant level of intrinsic stimulus uncertainty (e.g. a square law transducer and a low level of intrinsic uncertainty). Our analysis showed that estimating a single ß from results averaged over several experimental sessions was slightly more accurate than averaging multiple estimates from several experimental sessions. However, the small levels of non-stationarity (SD ˜ 0.8 dB) meant that the difference between the estimates was, in practice, negligible.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1-10
Number of pages10
JournalVision Research
Volume76
Issue number1
Early online date4 Oct 2012
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 14 Jan 2013

Bibliographical note

NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Vision research. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Wallis, S. , Baker, D. , Meese, T. , & Georgeson, M. The slope of the psychometric function and non-stationarity of thresholds in spatiotemporal contrast vision. Vision research, Vol. 76, No. 1, (2013) DOI 10.1016/j.visres.2012.09.019.

Funding: BBSRC [BB/H00159X/1]; EPSRC [EP/H000038/1].

Keywords

  • psychometric slope
  • Detection threshold
  • Psychometric function
  • Spatial frequency
  • Observer variability

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